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THE CURSE OF GOLD. 


BY 


MRS. ANN S. STEPHENS. 

AUTHOR OF “WIVES AND WIDOWS,” “FASHION AND FAMINE,” “THE SOLDIER’S ORPHANS,” 
“THE REJECTED WIFE,” “ TH0|^QJJ> HOMESTEAD,” “THE WJPiJS^U SECRET,” 
“MABEL’S MISTAKE,” “THE GOLD BRICK,” “SILENT STRUGGLES,” 

, “ MARY DERWENT,” “ DOUBLY FALSE,” “ THE HEIRESS.” 


I 

Earth teems with good and evil : from her breast 
The rooted corn springs vigorous to the sun; 

While summer breezes toss its bearded crest 
Until a glorious ripening work is done. 

Thus men are amply fed and doubly blessed. 

Deep from the caverns of her stony heart, 

Toil drags the yellow gold, which, burning there, 

Is innocent of harm, — but once apart 
From its dark motherhood, fell hate, and care, 

Curse half its uses in life’s stormy mart. 


Of 


PHILADELPHIA: 

T. B. PETERSON & BROTHERS; 

3 0 G CHESTNUT STREET. 


Jr J 

' sy '■ Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1869, by 

r^Vb T. B. PETERSON & BROTHERS, 

(V in the Clerk’s Office of the District Court of the United States, in and for the 
Eastern District of Pennsylvania- 


ANN S. STEPHENS’ WORKS. 


Each Work complete in one vol., 12mo. 


THE CURSE OF GOLD. 

WIVES AND WIDOWS. 

THE HEIRESS. 

TnE REJECTED WIFE. 

FASHION AND FAMINE. 


THE GOLD BRICK. 

SILENT STRUGGLES. 


THE OLD HOMESTEAD. 

MARY DERWENT. 


THE SOLDIER'S ORPHANS. 

THE WIFE'S SECRET. 

MABEL'S MISTAKE. 

DOUBLY FALSE. 

Price of each, $1.75 in Cloth; or $1.50 in Paper Cover. 


Above books are for sale by all Booksellers. Copies of any or all 
of the above books will be sent to any one, to any place, postage pre- 
paid, on receipt of their price by the Publishers, 

T. B. PETERSON & BROTHERS, 

306 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia, Pa. 


TO 

MRS. DUDLEY S. GREGORY, 

OF JERSEY CITY, 


THIS VOLUME IS DEDICATED, 

WITH 

THE SINCERE FRIENDSHIP 

AND RESPECT OF THE AUTHOR, 




ANN S. STEPHENS, 




















































- 
























• 



• 



• 



V 















1 










•V. ’ ' 

... 




















* ' 

* 
























































- 


























































PEEFACE. 


It lias happened of late that several of my hooks 
have been more or less criticised for improbabilities 
attached either to a character, or some event selected 
from the rest of the book as too extravagant for 
belief or for the harmonies of true art. How, sin- 
gular enough, in every instance, the events or char- 
acters selected for these criticisms have been facts in 
themselves, or portraits drawn from persons well 
known to myself and others. If such criticism 
should fall on the character of Madame De Marke, 
I may perhaps be permitted to state that this woman 
has lived within the last fifteen years, and was well 
known in a certain neighborhood in the city of Hew 
York for her wealth, her eccentricity, and her ava- 
ricious habits. Her person, her manner of life, and 
her exti^me parsimony, are in no respect overdrawn. 
The room in which she lived and died is described 
exactly as she inhabited it in 1849. Of course, the 
events of the story which runs through this volume 
are not absolute facts, but the character of the 
woman, improbable as it may seem, is the vraisem - 
blance of a real individual. 


( 21 ) 




































* 










. 

- 




CONTENTS. 


Chapter page 

I. — A WARD IN BELLEVUE 25 

II. — MARY MARGARET DILLON 31 

III. — THE HOSPITAL NURSE 35 

IV. — MADAME DE MARKE 39 

V. — THE MARRIAGE CERTIFICATE 44 

VI. — THE DIAMOND EAR-RINGS 48 

VII. — THE TWO INFANTS 54 

VIII. — THE VIAL OF WHITE MEDICINE 57 

IX. — EARLY IN THE MORNING 62 

X. — THE VELVET PRAYER-BOOK AND ITS CONTENTS. 66 

XI. — JANE KELLY FINDS AN OLD ACQUAINTANCE... 73 

XII. — THE CONFERENCE IN MRS. JUDSON’S CHAMBER. 78 

XIII. — MRS. JUDSON DISTRIBUTES THE FUNDS 82 

XIV. — THE SAINT AND THE SINNER . 91 

XV. — PREPARING FOR THE FUNERAL 98 

XVI. — PARTING WITH THE CHILD 105 

XVII. — WHERE COULD SHE GO? 110 

XVIII. — TURNED OUT-OF-DOORS 118 

XIX. — MEMORIES AND RESOLUTIONS 122 

XX. — ALL ALONE 126 

XXI. — DIAMOND CUT DIAMOND 130 

XXII. — THE ODD EAR-RING 133 

XXIII. — A FRIEND IN NEED 138 

XXIV. — MARY MARGARET DILLON’S SHANTY 142 

XXV. — SEEKING FOR HELP 150 

XXVI. — THE PROFESSED PHILANTHROPIST 155 

XXVII. — A CHARITABLE CROSS-EXAMINATION 161 

XXVIII. — JANE KELLY ON HER TRIAL 167 

XXIX. — SHELTERED AT LAST 171 

XXX. — MADAME DE MARKE AND HER PET 175 

XXXI. — THE YOUNG MAN’S RETURN 179 

XXXII. — SEARCHING FOR HIS WIFE 184 

XXXIII. — TURNING SHADOWS INTO SUNBEAMS 187 

XXXIV. — ELSIE, THE LUNATIC 190 

XXXV. — SHOWING HOW A GOOD WOMAN CAN DIE 193 

XXXVI. — THE OLD MANSION-HOUSE 201 

XXXVII. — THE CLOSED LIBRARY 207 


( 28 ) 


24 


Contents. 


Chapter page 

XXXVIII. — THE FAMILY BREAKFAST 214 

XXXIX. — THE TWO PORTRAITS 218 

XL. — THE BIRD-CAGE 222 

XLI. — NURSES FOR THE CHILDREN OF THE POOR 227 

XLII. — THE ADOPTED SON : 234 

XLIII. — SITTING BY THE DOOR 240 

XLIV. — THE ITALIAN VILLA 246 

XLV. — THE STRANGE LADY AND HER CHILD 250 

XLVI. — THE MANIAC AND THE CHILD 255 

XLVII. — THREE HEARTS GO OUT TO LITTLE EDDIE 259 

XLVIII. — THE IMAGE IN THE GLASS 262 

XLIX. — ENEMIES MEETING 266 

L. — A VISITOR TO BREAKFAST 271 

LI. — OUT IN THE STORM 276 

LII. — OUT IN THE STORM 280 

LIII. — COMING HOME FROM CALIFORNIA 283 

LIV. — LOUIS DE MARKERS CONFESSION 289 

LV. — THE NIGHT OF MISS JUDSON’S WEDDING 293 

LVI. — THE BROTHERS TALK OVER THEIR FATHER’S 

DEATH 297 

• LVII. — THE SECRET MARRIAGE. — LOUIS GOES ON 

WITH HIS STORY , 304 

LVIII. — LOUISA’S LETTERS 307 

LIX. — AT BELLEVUE HOSPITAL 311 

LX. — THE FEMALE MISER IN HER DEN 317 

LXI. — MADAME’S GOLDEN CRUCIFIX 323 

LXII. — BEGGING FOR FOOD 327 

LXIII. — THE IRON-BOUND BOX 332 

LXTV. — THE BROTHERS CONSULT AGAIN 334 

LXV. — THE WASHERWOMAN’S INTRUSION 338 

LXVI. — A DOMESTIC STORM 344 

LXVII. — THE WOUNDED BIRD 349 

LXVIII. — DOUBTS AND FEARS 353 

LXIX. — MADAME DE MARKE’S DEATH-BED 359 

LXX. — LITTLE EDDIE’S GRIEF 365 

LXXI. — QUESTIONS AND CONFESSIONS 371 

LXXII. — ELSIE’S MARRIED LIFE 376 

LXXIII. — ELSIE RETURNS HOME 381 

LXXIV. — ANNOUNCEMENT OF THE WEDDING 386 

LXXV. — THE INTERRUPTED CEREMONY 393 

LXXVI. — RIGHTED AT LAST 397 

LX XVII. — ABOUT THE LITTLE BOY 403 


THE 


CURSE OF GOLD. 


CHAPTER I 


A WARD IN BELLEVUE. 


HE sick ward of a hospital, mockingly, it would seem, 



called Bellevue. The room was long, low in the ceil- 
ing, and lighted by a range of windows sunk deep in the 
wall, which overlooked the East River and an expanse of 
Long Island that curved along the opposite shore. 

A few poverty-stricken women, and some worse than that, 
because bowed down by shame as well as poverty, had sought 
this ward as the only place in which their anguish and sor- 
row could find shelter. 

Narrow, pauper cots, furnished with straw beds and cov- 
ered with coarse, checkered cotton, were ranged down each 
side of the room, with just space enough between to allow a 
sort of foot-path in which the nurses could pass from one bed 
to another. 

Every cot was occupied. Here a young face, so pale and 
mournful that your heart ached while gazing on it, was 
turned sadly toward you on the straw pillow, or a feeble 


( 25 ) 


26 


A Ward in Bellevue . 


hand would make an effort to draw up the coverlet, that you 
might not mark the flush of shame that stole over her fore- 
head, or discover the cause of that shame which lay nestled 
in her bosom. 

Other faces met your view, coarse and shameless, or hag- 
gard with long suffering ; and some turned upon you eyes 
so full of gentle submission, that you wondered why human 
beings so opposite in their nature should be crowded together 
in one room, even by the terrible leveller Poverty. 

Sounds, in painful harmony with the scene, greeted your 
entrance. Murmurs of sharp impatience, imprecations sup- 
pressed only by fear, and open complaints from the coarser 
and ruder inmates, drowned the sighs and timid whispers of 
maternal love that gave a breath of heaven even to that 
miserable place. 

Two cots in the room, both standing in a remote corner, 
were occupied like the rest, but gave forth no signs of life. 
They stood close together, and of the occupants it seemed 
impossible to say which was living, or which was actually 
dead, so coldly pale were the two faces that gleamed upon 
you from the pillows. Both were young, and one was won- 
drously beautiful even in that deathly state, when forehead, 
hands and lips were blanched to the whiteness of a corpse. 

The other was less beautiful, but very young, and so fra- 
gile that you wondered why death had waited to find her in 
that miserable place, for she was dying. The gray shadows, 
settling like a mist upon her face, the locked whiteness of 
her features, the imperceptible stiffening of her white hand 
upon the coverlet, all proclaimed this truth with terrible 
distinctness. But there was yet a breath of life close to her 
heart, a faint flutter as if a wounded bird had folded its 
wings forever, and then all was quiet as if sleep were there, 
or death had come twice. 

The gray shadows of a winter’s morning crept through 
the checkered curtains of a neighboring window, and hung 


A Ward in Bellevue. 


27 


coldly around that pauper couch ; and amid the muttering 
of patients restless with fever, or clamorous for nourishment, 
the wail of sickly infants, and the outcries of healthy ones, 
this poor young creature died and grew cold, un watched and 
unwept. 

The other, she who lay so like an exquisite statue on the 
neighboring couch, would no life ever return to her ? There 
was a faint motion of the bed-clothes, as if breath still lin- 
gered there ; but did it exist in that fair young mother or in 
the child, for she, poor thing, was a mother, and even in the 
chill of insensibility she held the little being into which her 
own seemed to have merged, clasped to her bosom. 

Just ^as the day dawned, a nurse came into the ward, not 
with her usual dauntless step, but stealthily, and casting 
sidelong glances from cot to cot, like a panther fearing to 
arouse his prey. She stopped once or twice and arranged 
the pillows of her patients, with a sort of cajoling attention, 
always leaving their faces turned from the corner where 
those two young creatures suffered. Then she stole softly 
between the two cots, and bending down her face till her 
soiled curl-papers almost touched the dead, listened, felt 
the cold hand on the coverlet, and cautiously turned down 
the clothes. 

At the head of each cot a square wooden label was hung 
against the wall, on which was painted the name and num- 
ber of the occupant. The nurse took down these labels 
when quite sure that one of these young women was dead, 
and replaced them again, looking furtively around as she 
did so. 

After making herself busy with the labels a while, the 
nurse stood over the cot of the dead woman and took a 
rapid survey of the ward. 

All was quiet, save the murmurs of a child, far down the 
room, who was struggling to keep its place in the arms of a 
drowsy mother. 


28 


A Ward in Bellevue. 


The nurse was relieved by this sound. It gave her time 
for breath. The rustle of her own dress seemed less start- 
ling. She turned to the other bed, stooped over it still more 
cautiously, and laid her hand down upon the heart of the 
senseless woman. 

She half rose, gave a sharp glance over her shoulder, and 
taking each of the fair hands, clasped so fondly around a 
sleeping infant, forced them gently apart, and lifted the 
child from its mother’s bosom. 

A shudder passed through the frame of that young mother, 
as if the last gleam of life had been torn from her heart. Her 
eyelids quivered, and her lips were, for an instant, faintly 
convulsed. 

The nurse turned suddenly to the other couch, and back 
again, while this life-struggle was going on. Without un- 
closing her eyes, the poor creature reached forth her arms, 
clasped them fondly again with a sigh of ineffable delight, 
and sunk away motionless, without a perceptible breath. 

But it was not for joy. As the child, a moment before, 
had seemed to keep the vitality in her heart with its own 
warmth, so now some outward chill drove back the blood to 
its centre. With a moan, and a struggle, she came to life, 
opened her great blue eyes, and fixed them wildly on the 
nurse. 

“ I am cold, oh ! so cold,” she said, shivering, and cower- 
ing down into the bed ; “ what have you done to me ? ” 

“ Bone to you ? ” said the nurse* faintly, “ done to you ? 
Nothing, but try my best to bring you to. Why, it’s almost 
dead you ’ve been, I don’t know how long.” 

The invalid did not hear this. A momentary impulse of 
strength seized upon her. She flung back the bed-clothes, 
and bending her face downward, fixed those wild eyes upon 
the child. One glance, and she lifted them with a sharp, 
questioning look to the woman, and passing her hand over 
the little face, whispered hoarsely, — • 


A Ward in Bellevue . 


29 


“What is this?” 

The nurse put her hands down and touched the infant. 
The poor mother felt those coarse hands shaking against 
her own, and shrunk away with a faint cry : it seemed as if 
they had inflicted a wound upon her. 

It was some moments before the woman spoke. When 
she did, it was with a sort of unnatural quickness, accom- 
panied with hurried glances down the room. 

“Where’s the doctor? It might have been expected. 
Fainting fits all night — overlaid and smothered it. Half 
on your face when I came- in — arms grasped around it like 
a vice. No wonder it ’s cold.” 

“ Cold. Is that all — ouly cold ? ” cried the mother, trem- 
bling all over, — “ only cold ? ” 

“ Cold as a stone, and dead as a door-nail, that ’s what it 
is ? ” answered the nurse, sharply, for that moment the physi- 
cian of the ward came in sight, and the nurse judged well 
of the effect her brutal speech would have on the young 
creature. 

With a cry, that in her feebleness scarcely arose above a 
wail, she fell back perfectly senseless again. 

“ What is the trouble here ? ” inquired the doctor, com- 
ing forward. “ Oh, I expected this ! ” lie added, glancing 
at the dead ; “ scarcely a breath of life in her from the first. 
The baby too, I suppose.” 

“ No ! ” answered the nurse, quickly ; “ that poor creature 
has lost her baby. Hers is just alive yet; I wish they 
would n’t send such delicate creatures here. It ’s enough to 
destroy one’s character to have them die off so.” 

“ But she is not dead,” replied the doctor, passing between 
the two cots, and taking the little hand that had fallen away 
from the child ; “ almost as bad though ; a hard chill — we 
shall have fever next! Take the child away. No wonder 
she feels cold ! How long has it been dead ? ” 

“ It was cold when I came in.” 


30 


A Ward in Bellevue . 


“ Well, well, have it removed. She will never come to 
with that freezing her to the heart.” 

“ And the other baby ? ” questioned the nurse, anxiously. 

“ Give it to one of these women to nurse, till something 
can be done ; and order two coffins. They must n’t lie here, 
or we shall have a panic among the patients.” 

The nurse made an effort to take the child once more from 
its mother’s arms ; but, for the first time, she seemed nervous 
and reluctant to touch the dead. The doctor startled her, 
saying impatiently, — 

“ There, be quick, or the woman will die ! That will do — 
now let me see if anything can put life into her ? Poor thing, 
poor thing ! It ’s a pity the baby is dead — but then what 
chance has an orphan in this world ? — better dead, if she 
could only be brought to think so ! ” 

While he was talking, the nurse bent suddenly to the 
floor and snatched up a small, silken bag, which, suspended 
by a braid chain, had been torn from the invalid’s neck 
when the babe was first removed from her arms. The doc- 
tor turned his eyes that way. 

“ I am always dropping this pin-cushion from my side ! ” 
she said, hurriedly, gathering up the chain in her hand ; 
“ there is no keeping any thing in its place.” 

“ Don’t stop for such nonsense,” cried the physician, im- 
patiently, “ or the woman will die under our hands.” 

The nurse thrust the silken chain and its appendage 
into her bosom, and began in earnest to render assistance. 


Mary Margaret Dillon . 


31 


CHAPTER II. 

MARY MARGARET DILLON. 

T HE poor young creature was aroused at length from 
the chill torpor that had seized upon her; but she 
awoke to a hot flush of fever, raving with pathetic wildness 
of a thousand things which no one comprehended — of a 
husband that had left her in the depths of trouble, of the 
child that she fancied herself clasping, and of the nurse who 
seemed forever and ever over her bed, as she persisted in 
thinking, like a great, black statue that had chilled her 
heart to death beneath its shadow. Thus she raved and 
muttered, while the fever kindled wilder and hotter within 
her veins, and her eyes grew star-like in their glittering 
brightness. 

Hour after hour she kept up these mental wanderings, 
and then sunk away again. 

Meantime the nurse had been very restless under the 
doctor’s eye, and negligent beyond anything known of her 
before when he was away. But for the kindly interposition 
of a convalescent patient in the ward, the poor invalid must 
have perished from inattention, if not from positive viola- 
tions of all medical rules. 

The woman of whom we speak was a plump, wholesome, 
little Irish dame, with the freshest face and warmest heart 
that ever looked poverty in the face. 

She had entered the hospital quietly, and grateful for the 
asylum thus provided for her in time of need. In the 
depths of winter, with three little children “ to the fore,” as 
she said, and the husband without a hand’s turn of work, 
what had she to do eating up the bread that was but half 
enough to keep the hunger from so many clamorous mouths. 
Why should n’t she take herself to the hospital thankfully, 


32 


Mary Margaret Dillon . 

while the good man — for want of better work — minded 
the childer at home ? 

Mary Margaret Dillon had no pride in the matter, not 
she. Bellevue, in her estimation, belonged to the people. 
John possesses a right to vote among the sovereigns and 
had paid taxes, for which his landlord took the credit, in 
the shape of exorbitant rents for the last ten years. Thus 
he had secured, as she considered it, a lien upon at least one 
humble straw bed in the hospital, and of that she took pos- 
session with as little feeling of humiliation as beset Victoria 
when she mounted the throne of England. 

When the scene we have just described happened, Mary 
Margaret, who had neither lost her roses nor her cheerful- 
ness, was sitting upon the side of her cot, striving with her 
active little hands to remedy the fit of a scant calico dress 
in w r hich her fourth born was arrayed. As she sat thus, 
smiling fondly upon the infant, and finding a world of 
beauty in its plump face and tiny red hands, the buxom 
mother would have made a capital model for one of Ru- 
bens’s Madonnas. 

“ Is n’t it a darlint ?” she murmured, touching each velvet 
cheek daintily with the tip of her finger, pursing up her lips and 
emitting a succession of audible kisses upon the air, the sound 
of which almost brought the first smiles to her baby’s mouth. 

“ Is n’t it a wonder and a beauty, with its diamond black 
eyes and ilegant hair, like his father before him?” she con- 
tinued, stretching the little fellow across her lap, and striv- 
ing to cover the tiny feet that would peep out from beneath 
the coarse dress, by two or three vigorous pulls at the skirt. 
“ Won’t the children be dancing with joy when they get us 
home again; and John, faix ! but he’ll never grumble that 
there’s another mouth to fill — barring the year when it’s in 
arms, poor crathur — for the blessed Virgin that sent the 
baby ’ll find work for us long before it ’ll have teeth for the 
praties, sure.” 

Thus the good woman and unconscious philosopher mut- 


33 


Mary Margaret Dillon . 

tered to herself, as she sought to redeem her babe from the 
unbecoming effects of his pauper dress — smoothing its silken 
hair with the tips of her fingers; and coaxing it to smile 
with kisses and gentle touches of the cheek between whiles, 
she continued her murmurs of gentle fondness, happy as a . 
mother bird upon her nest. 

She had tied the awkward sleeves back from its Shoulders 
with knots of faded pink ribbon, taken from her own cap, 
and w T as holding it at arm’s length with a broad, smile of 
triumph, when the nurse passed the cot with her checkered 
apron folded over some object that she held to her bosom. 

“ What have ♦ye there, Misses Kelly, saving yer pris- 
ence?” inquired Mary Margaret, holding her baby poised 
in mid-air, and turning her kindly eyes upon the nurse. 

“ It is n’t dead, sure?” 

“ She is answered the nurse, nodding her head toward 
the cot. 

Mary Margaret held her breath, and tears stole to her 
eyes as she stood up, trembling beneath the weight of her 
infant — for she was still very feeble — and looked toward the 
pale face of the dead. 

“ And the poor, young crathur in the cot alongside, what 
has happened to her ? ” inquired Mary Margaret. 

“ She’s as good as dead, don’t you hear how she raves ? 
Mutter — mutter, she has n ? t strength for more : all the doc- 
tors on earth could n’t -save her.” 

“And her baby ? ” asked Mary Margaret, filled with com- 
passion, and hugging her own child fondly to her bosom. 

“ Oh ? that’s yonder by the dead woman, cold as she is ! ” 

Mary Margaret held her child closer, and the tears 
streamed down her face. 

“ Give me a look at the motherless crathur,” she said, lay- 
ing her child upon the cot, and reaching forth her arms. 

The nurse hesitated an instant, and then flung back her 
apron front tjte face qf the infant. 

2 


84 


Mary Margaret Dillon . 

“ Poor thing, poor thing, how deathly it looks ! what great, 
wild eyes ! How it stares at one ! ” exclaimed Mary Mar- 
garet, half sobbing. 

“It’s half starved,” answered the nurse, looking down 
upon her burden with a callous smile; “it won’t feed. To- 
night will see the end on’t.” 

Mary Margaret glanced at her own sleeping child, and 
then turned her brimming eyes upon the other. 

“ Give it here,” she said, “there’s enough for both — give 
him here.” 

The nurse frowned and drew up her apron. 

“ The doctor must settle that. It’s not i$y business, Mrs. 
Dillon,” she said, harshly. 

“The doctor! Well, where is he? Be quick and ask 
him, or let me.” 

“ When he comes in the morning will be time enough,” 
answered the nurse, preparing to move on. 

“ The morning ! Why, the poor crathur ’ll be gone afore 
that,” persisted the kind woman, stepping a pace forward, 
and supporting herself with difficulty. “ Let me have it, I 
say ! ” 

The nurse jerked her arm from the feeble grasp laid upon 
it, and harshly bade the woman return to her bed and mind 
her own business. 

Mary Margaret tottered back and sat down upon the foot 
of her couch. 

“ It ’ll die, it ’ll die afore the blessed day is over,” she 
muttered, sadly, for her maternal heart ached over the 
orphan. “ Arrah, if the doctor was only to the fore ! ” 

She ended this piteous exclamation with a joyful outburst. 

“The saints be praised, here he is, welcome as cowslips in 
spring ! ” and regardless of her feeble state, she arose and 
stood ready to address the doctor, as he came down the ward. 

The nurse uttered a sharp exclamation, in which an oath 
ysras but half smothered, and advancing fiercely toward the 


The Hospital Nurse. 35 

cot, flung the famished child down by the sleeping babe of 
Mary Margaret. 

“ There, take the brat ! ” she said, with an unnatural laugh. 
“I meant that you should nurse it all the time, if you 
had n’t teased one’s life out about it.” 

Mary Margaret did not answer ; her limbs were trembling 
like aspens, and she sunk upon the cot overpowered with 
fatigue. Drawing the little stranger softly to her bosom, 
she pressed it gently there, felt the thrill of its eager lips, 
and drawing a deep breath of satisfaction, watched its great 
eyes turned upon her own, till, as if struck by the same 
mesmeric influence, the woman and the infant slumbered 
together. 

It was a sweet picture of helplessness and charity, a noble 
proof that no human being can find a place so humble upon 
this earth, that some good to others may not be wrought out 
of it. 

As the woman and children lay thus, buried in that gentle 
sleep which sometimes falls like dew after a good action, the 
lifeless young creature was lifted from her pauper death-bed, 
and carried forth to be stretched in the still more poverty- 
stricken pine coffin. Then the marble form of the infant 
was carelessly carried after, and that bereaved mother fol- 
lowed it with her wild, bright eyes, and laughed as the door 
closed. 


CHAPTER III. 

THE HOSPITAL NURSE. 

L ATE in the evening, the hospital nurse, who had been 
an evil actor in the scene we have just described, stood, 
with a smoking lamp in her hand, in a closet or store-room 


36 


The Hospital Nurse. 

where the patient’s garments were kept. From one of the 
shelves she took a bundle tied up in a coarse woollen shawl, 
and drew forth a long merino cloak that had evidently 
found its origin in old Ireland. She folded the cloak cau- 
tiously around her, and selecting a bonnet from a score or 
two that filled a side press, she tied a green veil closely over 
it. Then she extinguished her lamp, finding her way out 
by the glow of its smouldering wick, and leaving a cloud 
of offensive smoke to deepen the already unpleasant atmos- 
phere of the room. 

The woman had evidently intended to disguise herself, and 
she stole like a thief down the dark passages of the build- 
ing, avoiding the officers and keeping close to the shadow 
whenever she came within the range of a light, like one who 
feared to be seen. 

At last she came out into the grounds in front of the hos- 
pital. The moon was up, but hidden occasionally by masses 
of clouds that cumbered the sky with a darkness that 
threatened snow. The woman waited under the shadow of 
the steps till a heap of these clouds had completely obscured 
the moon, and then darted out, taking a central walk that 
led from the principal entrance to Bellevue down to the water. 

A grape-arbor, at the time of our- story, ran half-way 
down this walk, covering it, even in winter, with a thousand 
gnarled and twisted vines, that kept. the light away and 
afforded the obscurity of which she seemed so desirous. 

Here she paused, and heaving a deep breath, w T alked more 
leisurely forward, drawing her veil closer, and folding the 
cloak over her garments more resolutely as she approached 
the open grounds again. 

As she came forth, the njoon had waded half through the 
bank of clouds, that had overwhelmed it for a moment, and 
began to pour its faint silver along their edges, a sight beau- 
tiful to look upon, but very repulsive to the woman, who 
wanted no radiance and could expect no beauty on the dark 
path she had begun to tread. 


37 


The Hospital Nurse. 

Resolved to be in advance of the threatened illumination, 
she darted in a slanting direction across a range of garden 
beds, that lay,* a mass of trodden mud and decaying vege- 
table stumps, between her and the southern wall. 

Again she was in safety, though the moon had rolled forth 
into the clear of the sky once more, and all around was 
dimly illuminated. She stood in the shadow cast by a low, 
stone building, half buried behind heaps of coal, empty 
barrels, and all sorts of refuse lumber that had been allowed 
to accumulate in that portion of the grounds. 

Another might have trembled and shrunk back appalled 
from the position in which this woman found herself. It was 
late at night, and she stood in the very presence of death. 
The atmosphere was heavy and so oppressive, that even in 
the clear cold of the night, a faintness crept over her, not 
from fear, not from any over-excitement of the nerves, but 
purely from the unwholesome air that she breathed. 

She • knew that the low stone building was heaped with 
the dead, prepared for burial with such scant care as the 
pauper receives. She knew, also, that there was an epi- 
demic in the hospital, and that this store-house of mortality 
was unusually crowded ; but this gave her no uneasiness, 
and she shook off the sickness that oppressed herewith a sort 
of scorn, as if she and death had become too familiar for 
him to take such liberties with her. 

The effect which habit produces upon a coarse nature, 
was repulsively visible here. The woman stood within a 
narrow path, over which the dead-house flung its repulsive 
shadow. On the other side the moonbeams fell, grim and 
ghastly, revealing double rows of rough pine coffins, lifted 
endwise, and arranged in hideous proximity, so far as the 
dim light w T ould permit her to see. 

Thus between these hollow receptacles prepared for the 
dead, and death itself, the woman walked, the moonlight 
revealing the suggestive horror on one hand, while a dense 


38 The Hospital Nurse . 

shadow and a thick wall of stone shut out the real horror 
close by. 

But what cared the hospital nurse for this? The coffins 
on her right, so glistening and ghastly, were nothing but a 
heap of pine boards fashioned in a fantastic shape to her. 
The building simply a grim pile of stone, which cast a con- 
venient shadow for her to walk in. She rather resented the 
closeness of the atmosphere, but scorned to walk faster, and 
cast it off with a sort of defiant toss of the head, muttering 
that “ she could stand anything, and was n’t to be frightened 
by shadows, not she ! ” 

Thus picking her steps leisurely, she went down this val- 
ley of death ; and secure of not being discovered from the 
hospital windows, passed through a gate, in the wall near 
the water, which had most conveniently been left unlocked 
by the porter. 

Once free of the hospital walls, Jane Kelly moved on 
with more resolution. An omnibus stood at its station on 
one of the avenues. She entered it, and seating herself in 
an extreme corner, subsided, to all appearances, into a state 
of passive indifference. 

The omnibus heaved and rumbled on its way, receiving . 
here and there a woman of the lower classes, or a half in- 
toxicated man passing home to his family after a primary 
meeting or a reunion in some corner grocery. 

The hospital nurse got out where Nassau Street verges 
from Chatham, and disappeared after walking half a dozen 
blocks down one of the cross streets. We find her again 
threading her way up through the darkness of a large build- 
ing, divided into offices and rooms of various sizes, mostly 
untenanted at that hour of the night. The passages were 
profoundly dark ; the staircase narrow, winding in and out 
with no regard to architectural rules ; in some places consid- 
erably out of repair, while in others bits of coal and pea- 
nut husks crunched underfoot, and gave evidence of a gen- 
eral state of untidiness perceptible even in the dark. 


Madame De Marhe. 


39 


At last tlie woman came to a wooden door, at which she 
paused. A gleam of light stole through a crevice over the 
threshold, and struggled around an iron key half turned in 
the lock. With this came a faint noise as of some person 
moving within. 

Jane Kelly knocked at this door, rather timidly, as if she 
were a little uncertain about the place she sought. 

There was no answer. But the noise of a moving chair, 
and a shuffle of feet as if approaching the door, kept Jane 
Kelly stationary. After some delay the door was partially 
opened and a face looked through. 

“ Who are you ? What do you want here with a veil on 
that nobody can see through? Go away,” said a sharp, 
angry voice. 

“ You told me to come ! ” said the woman, lifting her veil 
and bending forward that her features might be seen. 

“ Not at this time of night,” cried the voice, which now 
exhibited a slightly foreign accent ; and, without having 
really seen the face presented for her inspection, the woman 
who owned it was about to close the door entirely. 

“You don’t know me. I came from Bellevue,” said the 
nurse ; “ you told me to come, and I’m here.” 

“ Bellevue, Bellevue. Oh! and in the night. Come in; 
has anything happened ? anybody dead, eh ?” 

The door was flung open more generously, and the visitor 
half pulled, half invited through. 


CHAPTER IV. 

MADAME DE MARKE. 

mHE room in which Jane Kelly found herself was almost 
JL in darkness. Borne smouldering embers sent faint red 
gleams from an open fireplace, over which a strip of coarse 


40 


Madame De Marhe. 


bagging had been nailed to keep in the smoke, and by this 
she could only discover that a poverty-stricken look per- 
vaded everything around her. A small weird-like woman 
stood but half revealed by the light, gazing sharply upon 
her. Spite of the darkness, she felt that two keen black 
eyes were piercing her through and through. 

All at once the woman stooped, and taking a handful of 
shavings from an old candle-box that stood on the hearth, 
flung them upon the embers. 

A burst of light revealed a smoke-begrimed room, a tat- 
tered old bed, some broken chairs tied together with coarse 
twine, and a rickety table. The sudden light was greeted 
by a hoarse croaking which came from the direction of the 
bed ; but the flash was so transient that these things left lit- 
tle impression on the girl’s mind, which fastened entirely on 
the woman herself. Lean, spare, pinched in all her features, 
grim, unwashed, witch- like, the owner of that room stood in 
its midst, with the sudden radiance full upon her one minute, 
and the next she was lost in shadows — all but the eyes, 
which were still peering into Jane Kelly’s face. 

“ Holy mother ! I shall have to light the candle, after all. 
Waste, waste, nothing but waste. Stand still while I get at 
a coal of fire. Don’t move, or you might tread on the cat, 
and she won’t like it.” 

Here the woman went rattling among some loose articles 
of crockery on the table, and falling upon her knees before 
the fireplace, ignited a tallow candle with much puffing and 
blowing. Then she stood up, held the candle over her 
head, and searched her visitor from head to foot. 

“ There, there, sit down,” cried the woman, sweeping a 
lean, gray cat from the rush-bottom of an old chair with one 
broken arm, and presenting it to her guest in a quick, eager 
way. 

“ Any news ? — anything to tell ? Why should you come 
so late? Why don’t you speak?” 

“ Yes, I’ve got news. It ’s all over — ” 


Madame Be Marke. 


41 


“ What ? Dead ? Really dead ? But which of ’em ? 
Not both ? That would be too good luck ! Not both, eh ? ” 

“ No, madame, that is n’t just true yet. But to-morrow 
will tell the story. If it had n’t been for a woman in the 
ward, who would give the medicine after I’d forgot it agin 
and agin, you might have saved the expense of two graves. 
Something interesting, you know, in burying a baby on its 
mother’s bosom. 

“ ‘We laid you down to sleep, Mary, 

With your baby on your breast.’ 

“ Sweet song, is n’t it, ma’am ? that is what I call touching.” 

“ What are you talking about touching ? Poetry ! froth 
and nonsense ! I thought you came here on business — to 
tell me something.” 

“ So I did ; have n’t I told you that the baby was dead ? ” 

“ But she ! how about her ?” 

“ She was just agoing, when the doctor — ” Jane Kelly 
broke off suddenly, for Madame De Marke sprang to her 
feet and caught her by the dress. Jane understood this sort 
of thing and flung her off rudely enough. 

“Then she isn’t dead?” cried the woman, working the 
long, sharp nails of her right hand fiercely against the palm. 
“But the child? Is that dead and buried?” 

“ Oh ! I saw that nicely stowed away among a heap of 
little coffins, on a wheelbarrow, and ready to be bundled off 
to the dead-house. All right with the baby!” 

“ You ’re sure there’s no mistake ? ” 

“ Sure ? Did n’t I put on its cotton shroud myself, — a 
mighty scant thing, only just wide enough to wrap around its 
little limbs without a fold ? I marked the coffin, too, with my 
own hands, letter L, with chalk. If you want to be satis- 
fied, it’s easily found, and can be kept till the mother is 
ready. It ’ll save expense, besides being so interesting.” 

“ Expense ! ” cried the occupant of the room, with a look 


42 


Madame De Mar he. 


of sharp anxiety. “ Expense ! I thought the city bore 
that. Do they charge for putting a miserable baby into 
Potter’s Field?” 

“ No, but then most people like a single grave, you know ; 
it only costs a dollar.” 

“ Only costs a dollar ! as if dollars were made to fling 
into Potter’s Field. Why, woman, do you know how much a 
dollar is worth? How much interest it will bring, how 
many years it will take a dollar to double? A dollar for a 
dead baby! If I’d spent dollars so extravagantly, do you 
think I should ’a’ been rolling in gold now, rolling, rolling in 
it — do you hear ? ” 

Jane Kelly cast a rather scornful glance around the mis- 
erable chamber, with its naked floor, single bed, and coarse 
wooden chairs. This did not look much like rolling in gold. 

“You don’t believe me ? you think I lie. Very well, very 
well. You fear that I cannot pay up ; very well again ; we 
shall see to that ! ” 

“It’s no joke,” said Jane Kelly, who really did begin to 
fear for the safety of her bribe, after discovering the naked- 
ness of the land. “ It’s no joke to do what I’ve done ; and 
a poor body like me might be a trifle anxious about the pay, 
without blame, let me tell you, ma’am.” 

“Did you kill the baby?” inquired Madame De Marke, 
in a low, cunning whisper. “ Because if you did, of course 
that makes a difference. Did you kill it ? ” 

Jane sat silent, tempted to assent ; for the woman’s words 
seemed to promise a heavier reward, if crime had really been 
committed ; and her rapacity overcame her prudence. 

“Did you kill it?” eagerly repeated the woman. 

“ Don’t ask me!” answered the nurse, drawing down her 
veil as with a spasm of remorse, “ I don’t want to think 
about it.” 

“ Then you did kill it ! ” cried the woman, and her little, 
black eyes twinkled with mingled cupidity and malice. 


Madame De Marlce. 


43 


“ The price ought to be doubled, ma’am. One’s conscience 
is worth something.” 

“Double! oh, ho! Double, is it?” cried Madame De 
Marke, rubbing her long, thin hands together with mali- 
cious glee. “ Why, woman, it’s you that should give me 
money for keeping your wicked secret, M^ry Mother f or- 
give me.” 

Madame reached forth her hands, and took a golden cru- 
cifix, with a piece of twine attached, from a ridge over the 
fireplace which marked the line where a mantelpiece had 
been, and kissed it reverently. 

The sight of this crucifix, which was of pure gold and 
exquisitely wrought, gave Jane Kelly renewed confidence in 
the ability of her employer to reward the service she had 
rendered. Though a poor match for the shrewd and singular 
woman with whom she had to deal, Jane was quick-witted 
enough to see her mistake. But she allowed Madame 
De Marke to go on, while her own thoughts were taking 
form. 

“You see,” whispered madame, fixing her sharp eyes on 
the nurse, “ you see it is dangerous keeping a secret of this 
kind for any one. Then your coming here to-night, people 
might suspect me of having some interest in the matter, and 
that would never do. Still, for a trifle, say two or three 
months’ wages, I will keep silent about it.” 

“ Two or three months’ wages from me to you !” cried the 
nurse, astounded, “from me to you!” 

“Why, murder! you know, my dear, murder! you don’t 
seem to appreciate the nature of a secret like that.” 

“But I have committed no murder. The baby died 
naturally. Who talks of murder? I only let it alone. 
Where is the law agin that, I’d like to know.” 

“You did n’t kill it!” cried madame, with a grim smile, 
and still rubbing her hands; “did n’t kill it?” 

“‘Masterly inactivity,’ as the papers say, nothing more,” 


44 


The Marriage Certificate. 


answered the nurse, gathering self-possession as she re- 
marked the rather crestfallen looks of her companion. 

“Well, then, if the creature died naturally, what more 
can be said about it? Of course, you don’t want money for 
a baby that died of its own accord.” 

“ But I do want money, all you promised, and I will have 
it, too.” 

“All I promised? how much was that?” 

“ Two hundred dollars for the baby ; four, if both w r ent 
together,” answered Jane, resolutely. 

“ Two hundred dollars ! ” cried madame, lifting up both 
hands, with the long, claw-like nails, like a bird ready to 
pounce on his prey. “ Two hundred dollars ! Is the woman 
crazy? Why, it was two dollars; a handsome little fee to 
the nurse, for kindness and care of a poor girl that once 
lived with me. Two hundred dollars ! ” 

“ The poor young mother is n’t dead ; and good nursing 
may save her. I am a good nurse, when I fancy the patient, 
Madame De Marke.” 

— s 

CHAPTER Y. 

THE MARRIAGE CERTIFICATE. 

M ADAME DE MARKE was evidently startled by the 
threat which Jane Kelly insinuated, rather than 
spoke ; her eyes fell and were lifted again with a sidelong 
glance. Jane read the glance, and her own eyes filled with 
the low cunning always uppermost in her nature. 

“ I have two ways of nursing. That ‘ masterly inactivity,’ 
which worked so well for the baby — regular attention to 
the doctor’s directions when he happens to be an experi- 
mentalizing student, or inattention to his orders when he is 
honest and knows what he is about. Any one of ’em is 


45 


The Marriage Certificate . 

pretty sure to create a demand for two breadths of cotton 
muslin and a pine coffin.” 

“And which of these will you take?” asked madame, 
anxiously. 

“ None of them, madame. You don’t choose to settle up, 
and I don’t choose to work for nothing. Can’t afford it ; 
nurses’ pay is next to being a beggar ; it’s only two months 
since they gave me so much as would keep me.” 

“Why, I thought you had been in Bellevue for years?” 

“ Oh, yes ! off and on I have. But then I was only a 
nurse with five dollars a month. Not much chance to make 
money, except once in a wdnle, when somebody outside 
wants a thing hushed up, like this, for instance, or a patient 
happens to hide a few dollars under her pillow, which gives 
a few lean pickings and stealings to the nurses.” 

Madame De Marke’s eyes brightened, and a crafty smile 
stole over her lips. “ Perhaps she’ll have some money hid 
away. I should n’t wonder ; enough to pay for your trouble 
all round ; she always was hoarding up. Oh, I have no 
doubt you may trust to finding heaps of money between her 
beds, but she’ll take care of it while there is a breath of life 
in her, never fear that.” 

The nurse laughed a low, sly laugh, that rather discom- 
posed her hostess. 

“ I’ve searched,” she said ; “ the poor thing lay insensible 
two whole hours.” 

“Then you found nothing?” inquired the Frenchwoman, 
with a look of keen anxiety. 

“Nothing but a little silk bag, with some papers in it.” 

“Papers! What were they? I have missed papers. 
What were they? Or perhaps you can’t read. Let me 
look at the papers.” 

“ Oh ! yes,” answered the nurse, demurely, “ I can read. 
There was a paper with some poetry on it. 

“ Poetry ! ” cried Madame De Marke, in a tone of ineffable 


46 The Marriage Certificate . 

contempt, but which gave forth a burst of relief also. “ Poe- 
try ! is that all ? ” 

“No,” replied Jane Kelly, with quiet deliberation. “ There 
was some marriage lines between George De Marke and 
Catharine Lacy.” 

Though her face was repulsive and dull from want of 
washing, Madame De Marke turned pale, and her eyes began 
to gleam with fierce desire when Jane told what the papers 
were of which she had become possessed. She stretched forth 
her hand, and commenced eagerly working the fingers, as a 
hungry parrot gropes for his food. 

“ Give me the lines. They belong to me. My name was 
Catharine, and De Marke’s name was George. Give me the 
lines. She stole them.” 

“Haven’t got them with me,” said Jane, folding the 
cloak more closely around her, with real fear that the witch- 
like woman would tear them from her bosom, if she knew 
that they were about her person. 

“ But you will bring them ? — say to-morrow night.” 

Jane Kelly laughed, and looking into the eyes of the eagei 
woman, muttered, — 

“Nothing for nothing.” 

“I — I will give you the — that is, a hundred dollars for 
the paper,” urged the woman, still working her fingers 
eagerly. 

“To-night?” 

“Well, yes, if you give up the paper; but then for cash 
down there’ll be a discount, — say fifty dollars. Times are 
very hard.” 

“Not a cent less than the full hundred,” answered the 
nurse resolutely. 

Madame De Marke sat restlessly in her chair. The idea 
of parting with so much money was absolute torture. A 
hundred dollars ! Why, she did not spend more than half 
that sum on herself during a whole year ; and for that inso- 


47 


The Marriage Certificate. 

lent wretch to ask so much for a single scrap of paper! the 
very thought enraged her. 

“Say seventy-five now,” she pleaded, in a wheedling tone, 
weaving her fingers softly together. 

“ I don’t want to sell the paper. If the girl gets well, as 
I mean she shall, it’ll be worth more than a hundred dol- 
lars to her.” 

“ But she has no money.” 

“Well, I can afford to do without money when a kind 
act is to be done. The city government always gives me a 
home and work when I want them.” 

“ Take seventy-five.” 

“ Well, say seventy-five for the paper, and a hundred for 
the baby.” 

“ The baby again ! ” snarled Madame De Marke, “ it ’s 
dead of its own accord. I won’t pay a sous for it — not a 
sous ! ” 

Jane Kelly hesitated a moment, looked around the room 
as if afraid of being overheard, and then leaning forward, 
whispered a few words in Madame De Marke’s ear. 

“I — I ’ll give you the money. Seventy-five dollars down, 
one hundred when — wdien it’s all set right.” 

“ It ’s all set right now.” 

“ Very well, very well, you are a noble girl, Jane. Jane, 
w T hat is the name?” 

“Kelly — Jane Kelly.” 

“You’re a noble girl, Jane Kelly. I’d trust you with 
untold gold. No, not gold, there is something very tempt- 
ing in gold, too tempting for human nature; but I’d trust 
you with silver untold, silver or bank-notes, if I only had 
them about me. But the times are so hard. Say fifty dol- 
lars down, all in solid silver ; it ’ll make your heart jump 
to hear the dollars fall upon each other. I tell you it’s 
enough to break one’s heart when such music goes the other 
way. Now you will take the fifty, that’s a dear good soul.” 


48 


The Diamond Ear-rings . 


Jane shook her head stubbornly. 

“ Now consider how much money is worth just now ; fifty 
dollars is worth a hundred at any other time.” 

Jane Kelly arose and prepared to go. Bad as she was, 
this woman’s clinging avarice disgusted her. 

“Well, well, if you will be so hard-hearted, 1 must try 
and raise the money, though how it is to be done I can’t 
begin to tell. Wait a minute. Just step out into the pas- 
sage, that’s a nice girl.” 


CHAPTER VI. 

THE DIAMOND EAR-RINGS. 

J ANE stepped into the passage, and Madame De Marke 
closed the door after her. In the upper portion of the 
door was a narrow sash window, covered inside with a faded, 
red valance, through which the light came with a dull, lurid 
glow. It will be remembered that Madame De Marke had 
kindled the end of a tallow candle after the entrance of her 
visitor, and thus the meagre room was in some sort illu- 
minated. 

Jane naturally kept her eyes on this curtain, for all with- 
out was profoundly dark. All at once she discovered a cor- 
ner of the faded maroon folded back, leaving a small, trian- 
gular corner of the glass uncovered. To this corner the 
nurse bent her eye, and saw Madame De Marke half-way 
under the bed, where she looked more like a bundle of old 
clothes crowded away from sight, than a human being. 

By her side, upon the soiled floor, stood an ink-bottle 
with its neck choked up by the swaling stump of her candle. 
For a moment, the body of Madame De Marke almost dis- 


49 


The Diamond Ear-rings. 

appeared under the bed, then she crept slowly backward, 
upon her hands and knees, dragging what had once been a 
small soap-box, after her. 

When once free from the bed, Madame De Marke arose 
softly to her feet, crept toward the door, and tried the lock 
to be certain that it was secure. Then she gave the valance 
a pull, which, fortunately for Jane, rather increased the 
scope of vision, which, for the moment, she was admonished 
not to enjoy. 

After satisfying herself that all was right, Madame De 
Marke seated herself on the floor, and drawing the ink- 
bottle close to her side, unlocked one of the iron bands that 
had been fastened around the box, and cautiously lifted the 
lid, raising the light in her left hand as she proceeded. 
Again she looked over her shoulder, holding her breath and 
half closing the lid. But perfect silence gave her confidence, 
and with a slow movement, as if each motion were a pang, 
she began to count out some gold pieces, which she laid in 
her lap with great caution, lest the gold should clink, and 
thus reach the ears which she knew must be listening out- 
side the door. 

All at once she stopped, held a half-eagle between her 
fingers, where it began to quiver and gleam from the un- 
steady motion of her hand, while a look of indescribable 
craft stole over her face. With both her eager hands, she 
huddled the gold back into its repository, and in its place 
drew forth a tattered morocco jewel-case That once had been 
purple, but had now a most shabby appearance, till she un- 
closed the lid and revealed a treasure that made Jane Kelly’s 
heart leap in her bosom. 

The concentrated light of the candle fell within the casket, 
and she knew by the rainbow gleams and sparkles flashing 
out, that jewels of price were almost within her grasp. 

Now Jane had a great passion for trinkets of all kinds, 
and it is doubtful if the whole of the bribe for. which she 


50 


The Diamond Ear-rings . 


waited, would not have taken the form of some paltry or- 
nament within twenty-four hours, had it been paid down in 
gold. As it was, she pressed her eye close to the glass, and 
peered gloatingly down upon the burning stones, conscious 
of their brightness, and with a dazed sense of their value. 

Directly Madame De Marke closed the casket, and thrust 
it into the depths of a soiled pocket, that hung between her 
ragged calico dress and a repulsive under-shirt made from 
the fragments of an old patch-work bed-quilt. Then she 
clasped the iron bars over her box, and going down upon her 
hands and knees again, thrust it away out of sight, reap- 
pearing feet foremost, while her face, as it looked out from 
under her arm, had the aspect of a laughing hyena, so vis- 
ible were the workings of some new-born diabolical craft 
upon it. 

“Now what is she about? what is it makes her smile so? ” 
thought Jane Kelly, recoiling from the window-pane with 
a shudder, for as the woman arose her sharp eyes were turned 
that way. “Is she a witch? Does she know that I am 
peeping ? Is that gold ? Is the case ” 

She broke off suddenly, and shrunk backward into the 
darkest corner of the passage, cowering down as if she had 
been seated on the floor and was but just aroused. 

Madame De Marke opened the door, and her little, sharp 
face peered out. 

“Come, come — hist, have ye gone?” she whispered. 

“No, I am here; the darkness makes me drowsy, that’s 
all!” answered Jane, coming forward, “especially after 
watching so many nights without a wink of sleep.” 

“Step in quick — why there’s heat enough gone through 
the door already to warm a barn. Heat costs money, don’t 
you know thaf ? It’s enough to ruin one to have company 
in this way, wasting everything.” 

Jane entered the room. 

“You hayen’t thought better of it? You are resolute to 


The Diamond Ear-rings . 51 

strip me of more money than I can save in a year? You 
won’t relent, eh?” 

“I want the money, ma’am, nothing more. It’s my just 
right. I’ve earned it, if anybody on earth ever did.” 

“And you won’t take anything but money, not money’s 
worth, now?” cried madame, peering eagerly into the face 
of her visitor. 

“Why? Have n’t you got the change handy? ” asked Jane, 
with her thoughts fixed longingly on the jewels she had seen. 

“ The change ! She calls seventy-five dollars change. As 
if a lone woman, like me, ever had so much money by her 
at once.” 

Jane thought of the gold she had seen, but still her wishes 
turned to the diamonds in preference, and she said quickly, 

“Well, money or money’s worth. I don’t much care 
which, so long as it’s the genuine article.” 

“Well,” said the old woman, drawing the casket slowly 
from her pocket, and opening it ; “ here’s something now 
worth five times the money, and just the thing for you, with 
your plump neck and rosy cheeks. What say? Will ye 
have ’em instead of the money, especially as the money 
can’t be had just yet ? ” 

“ Let me look at them ? ” cried Jane, eagerly seizing upon 
the case. “ How they do flash ! Ear-rings, breast-.pin. 
Oh ! but they bum like fire. What are they ? ” 

“ Diamonds ; every one worth heaps of money,” answered 
madame ; — “ took ’em as security for a debt, you know.” 

“And will you really let me have ’em?” asked Jane, al- 
most gasping for breath. 

“ Well, now you can’t expect ’em all, till there’s been 
more work done. Diamonds ain’t picked up from the gut- 
ters, I can tell you.” 

“But how many? The ear-rings now. May I have 
them ? ” 

She lifted up a long, old-fashioned ear-ring, as she spoke, 


52 


The Diamond Ear-rings. 


glittering with innumerable pendants, that made her eyes 
sparkle as she held it up to the light. “ These now ? ” 

“ Not all at once,” answered madame, softly, and purring 
about her victim like a cat. “Say one ear-ring or the 
breast-pin for the papers, and the other ring when that girl 
is — is asleep, you know.” 

Jane shook her head, and grasped the ear-rings closer in 
her hand, gazing upon them with hungry eyes. 

“ No, no, I’d rather leave the breast-pin, and take both 
ear-rings.” 

Madame took the casket from her visitor’s hand, and half 
closed it. 

“ If I give both rings for the papers, there is no depend- 
ing on the rest. No, no ; take one, and come back for the 
mate when the whole job is finished.” 

“ But what good will one ring do me ? ” cried Jane, al- 
most with tears in her eyes. “ I can’t wear it ! ” 

“ But you will soon be after the mate,” answered madame, 
holding up the ring in her claw-like fingers, and making the 
pendants tinkle before the longing eyes of her guest. “ In 
three days they will both be yours.” 

“ Yes ! but what if it can’t be done? Some people never 
will die without a tussle for it. What good will this be to 
me then ? ” 

“ You can sell it for three hundred dollars, or pawn it.” 

“ Three hundred dollars ! ” cried Jane, incredulously. 

“More than that,” answered madame. “You thought I 
would n’t be liberal ; you higgled about the price. There is 
three times the sum in your hand, and without asking, too.” 

The low, wheedling tone in which this was spoken would 
have created suspicion in a person less eager in her greed. 
But Jane clutched the prize in her hand, though she still 
cast longing glances at the casket. 

“ When shall I see you again with news ? Remember, 
don’t come till you want a mate to that.” 


The Diamond Ear-rings. 53 

“ To-morrow night ; I ’ll come to-morrow night, see if I 
don’t.” 

“Be careful of the ear-ring, dear. Keep it about you. 
That Bellevue is such a place for thieves. Now the papers.” 

Jane took the little silken bag from her bosom, and gave 
it to the eager hands that were extended for it. 

“That will do. Now, good night, dear. Come again. 
Good night. If you should meet a policeman, just turn 
your face toward him, and he ’ll know it’s all right. You’ve 
got a beautiful face, Jane Kelly, a beautiful face, — no 
policeman that sees it will disturb you.” % 

Jane was now in haste to depart, and made her way out 
of the building in safety, though Madame De Marke only 
followed her to the nearest flight of stairs, with her candle 
and ink-bottle, leaving her to find the rest of her way out 
in darkness. 

Jane certainly did meet a policeman not many paces from 
Madame De Marke’s door, and mindful of the counsel she 
had received, her face was turned boldly toward him. He 
gave it a searching look, and walked on. 

Madame returned to her room, set her light on the bottom 
of a chair, and opening the little silken bag, examined its 
contents. Then, with a chuckle of intense delight, she drew 
forth her treasure-box again, put the papers, and what re- 
mained of the jewels, into it, and then blew out the candle, 
rubbing her hands with low, gleeful chuckles, that broke 
upon the stillness, at intervals, for half an hour. The wo- 
man had evidently accomplished some great point in her 
transactions with Jane Kelly that night. 



54 


The Two Infants . 


CHAPTER VII. 

THE TWO INFANTS. 

M ARY MARGARET DILLON lay in the sweet sleep 
which so frequently follows exhausting efforts. Clasped 
by her right arm she held the strange baby close to her bosom 
with persevering charity that lived even in her slumber. But 
her motherly face was turned, with the irresistible instincts 
of nature, toward the little chubby-faced fellow at her left. 
He had been nestling closer and closer under her arm with- 
out arousing her, and now lay drowsily comforting himself 
with his little red fist, at which he tussled and worked with 
persevering philosophy, now and then giving out a loud, rel- 
ishing smack, as if determined to notify the little interloper 
how richly he was provided for. 

In the energy of his satisfaction, the youngster threw out 
his feet, and made his tiny elbows play with a vigor that 
soon aroused Mary Margaret. She gathered up the strange 
baby to her bosom with a warmer clasp, as if to shield her- 
self from temptation, and then nestled her loving face down 
to the other baby, and bending back her arnv to give him a 
hug, she began lavishing kisses and blessings upon him. 

“Bless the rogue — arrah, bless the crathur! Sure his 
ginerous Irish blood is up already in consideration of the 
stranger baby ; faix, and is n’t he independent, as an Irish 
baby born in this blissed land of liberty should be, sure, 
continting himself intirely with a taste of his own blissed 
little fist, that by the token ’ll yet work for his mother whin 
she’s feeble and auld. Faix, and would n’t the father of 
him be a proud man, this minit, if he could see the little 
filler acting in all respects like a gentleman intirely ? ” 
Mary Margaret was interrupted in her pleasant natural 
talk by a faint shriek that came from the lower end of the 


The Two Infants. 


55 


ward, and starting up from between the two infants, she 
threw a skirt over her shoulders and ran down the dim 
room. She paused suddenly with an exclamation of terror, 
for there upon the cot where we left the pale, young mother, 
she saw a form so fair, so wild, and yet so spirit-like, stand- 
ing erect in the smoky light, that all the native 'Superstition 
of her race rose up to chill her. 

“ Blessed saints ! but it’s a wraith,” she murmured, sinking 
gently to her knees, “ the poor, beautiful crathur has "gone 
sure enough, and this is the shadow she has left, och, hone — 
och, hone.” 

A less fanciful person than good Mary Margaret might have 
mistaken the vision hovering about the pauper couch for 
something supernatural. The thin, childish face, so white 
at the temples and forehead ; the burning red of the cheeks ; 
those wild, feverish eyes flashing like stars ; the long, thick 
tresses sweeping down in a golden veil to the coverlet, were 
full of supernatural loveliness. Mary saw the thin, white 
hands and arms uplifted in wild grace ; the form, slender, 
waving “ like the stalk of some tall flower that threatens to 
break with the first blast of wind, rising, as it were, into the 
night.” It was enough to still the blood in the veins of that 
kind woman, and send her frightened speech in fragments 
of prayer to her lips. 

“Whist — whist! what is it sayin’? for sure it’s words 
that I hear. Drink, drink ! It’s alive ! it ’s the poor young 
crathur herself clamoring for the drop of could water, and 
no one forenent to give it. And I, unnatural heathen that 
I am, lying there atween the babies, and sleeping as if the 
whole world belonged to me. Water, drink, sartinly, me 
poor, white darlint ; jest aise yerself down till the pilly and 
see if I does n’t bring yees a hull teapot full.” 

It was useless making the request. The poor, young thing 
waved to and fro on the bed, flung out her thin hands, 
groping in the air for something to lay hold of ; then her 


56 


The Two Infants . 

fragile limbs seemed to wither up ; she sunk down through 
the murky white in a pale heap, covered only from sight by 
the abundance of her golden hair. 

“Hist, hist! what is the matter, darlint?” said Mary 
Margaret, softly dividing the silken waves from the childish 
face and attempting to arrange the bed. 

The young creature looked up, and a gleam of intellb 
gence shot through the fever in her eyes. 

“ I am parched, I want drink, my head throbs, my bosom 
is full of aching fire. My hands — put them in cold water, 
they are so hot — they will not let me touch it while these 
hands are so burning hot.” 

“ There is no drink here ! ” said Mary Margaret, search- 
ing among some cups and bowls that stood upon a chair near 
the bed, “ not a drop of anything.” 

Mary ran to her own bed, seized a basin of cold tea that 
her kindly persuasion had obtained from one of the nurses, 
and held it to the burning lips of the patient. Then she 
began to smooth down those long tresses with her hands, and 
by a thousand gentle movements intuitive to her womanly 
nature, quieted the delirium that had seized upon the poor 
girl afresh during the loneliness of night. 

As Mary Margaret was performing these kindly offices, 
she happened to turn her eyes toward a corner of the room. 
There was nurse Kelly, not asleep, as she had at first sup- 
posed, but with her arms folded on a little board table, her 
chin resting upon them, and her eyes peering angrily through 
the light shed from a smoky lamp hung behind her on the 
wall. 

Sharp and angry as the notice of a rattlesnake, came that 
glance through the darkness ; and Mary Margaret’s hands 
shook as she sat down the basin of tea w’ith a sort of ner- 
vous terror. Still she .was too brave and too earnest for any- 
thing like an ignominious retreat, even from the glare of 
those eyes. 


57 


The Vial of White Medicine. 

The poor, young patient was relieved by the drink so 
kindly given, and lay very quietly, unconscious of the ma- 
lignant influence that had crept even to her pauper couch, 
unmindful of the gentle care that fell like dew around her. 
But the noble Irish woman lingered at her post with an in- 
stinctive feeling that she was needed to keep watch and 
ward over that frail life. 

But young Ireland in the other cot had at last become 
heartily dissatisfied with the state of things in that neighbor- 
hood. The mouth from which his tiny fist was withdrawn 
now filled with indignant cries, and Mary Margaret, hastily 
gathering the skirt around her shoulders, ran back to silence 
the little rebel before he disturbed every patient in the ward. 

She lay down by the child outside the bed, supporting her- 
self on one elbow, for some holy instinct still kept her on 
the watch. After she had rested a while, and the voice of 
young Ireland had subsided into satisfied and half-cooing mur- 
murs, she saw the nurse arise cautiously, open a drawer of the 
table, and steal round to Catharine Lacy’s bed, over which she 
hovered a moment and disappeared in her corner again. 
Then came a few moments of silence, broken only by the 
deep breathing of the sleepers and a restless moan or two 
from the young woman’s cot. 


CHAPTER VIII. 

THE VIAL OF WHITE MEDICINE. 

M ARY MARGARET was strangely wakeful, and as her 
child sunk off to rest, she left her bed again and stole down 
the ward to see if her charge slept. Then the nurse arose 
and came boldly forward. A strange, wheedling smile hung 


58 


The Vial of White Medicine. 


around her lips, and there was something in her look that 
made Mary Margaret shudder. 

“ It ’s very kind of you, I’m sure, Mrs. Dillon, to be taking 
all this trouble for me, that is n’t fit for duty to-night no more 
than your baby there. I’m very grateful that you will haye 
an eye to this poor thing, for my sick headache just uses me 
up, and the doctor is very particular about her medicine. 
If you’d. only take charge now while I catch a little nap, it 
would be a charity to more than one ; but do be particular 
about the medicine.” 

Mary Margaret was seized with an unaccountable shudder, 
but she answered quite naturally, “ Sure and I’ll do me best, 
marm.” 

“ That’s a good soul ; don’t forget the medicine, the direc- 
tions are all on the bottles, and — and ” 

The voice was husky and unnatural, and all around her 
mouth settled a strange pallor, as if the sickness of which she 
complained had seized with new force upon her. 

“ I’ll do my best,” repeated Mary Margaret, and she sat 
down upon the foot of the poor young creature’s bed like 
one who had resolved to guard it well. 

The nurse went half-way to her chair in the corner, and 
turned back with her face from the light. 

“ In fifteen minutes it will be time to give her first dose,” 
she said, still huskily, and with an effort ; “ a teaspoonful, 
don’t forget.” 

“ I’ll not forget, will I, me purty darlint ? ” answered 
Mary Margaret, folding the two pale hands of the invalid 
between her palms, and gazing upon her with kindly mourn- 
fulness. 

The nurse stumbled back to her corner as if worn out with 
her headache, and sat brooding there, sometimes with her eyes 
closed, sometimes with that basilisk glance peering out from 
above her folded arms. She reminded you of a rattlesnake 
watching amid its own coils. 


59 


The Vial of White Medicine. 

Mary Margaret caught these glances once or twice without 
appearing to regard them, but they kept her intellect upon 
the alert, and without knowing exactly what she was to guard 
against, the good woman felt that harm was around her, and 
that the evil thing must find her watching. A slight change 
in her position threw the light directly across the chair upon 
which the cups and vials used about the sick had been placed, 
and where she had left her basin of weak tea. 

Without having consciously made the discovery, Mary 
Margaret became aware that the only vial which stood upon 
the chair had been moved, and that its contents, a pale wine 
color, had become white as water. Still the vial was the 
same, and as she bent over softly to read the label, that was 
also unchanged, a “ teaspoonful every hour.” This was what 
she read and had seen before while searching for drink 
among the empty cups. 

Why was this ? For what object had the contents of that 
vial been changed ? Who could have done it but the nurse, 
and why had she done it ? Then Mary Margaret began to 
ponder over the change in nurse Kelly’s manner — the 
sudden favor into which she had fallen, and an unaccount- 
able antipathy to give the medicine in that bottle seized upon 
her. 

“ Is n’t it time to give the medicine ? ” asked a low voice 
from the corner. “ It should be given on the stroke of the 
hour.” 

“Yes!” answered Mary Margaret, with a start, “it’s 
time.” 

She turned her back toward the nurse and received the 
light over her shoulder. A pewter spoon lay upon the chair. 
She held up the vial, and, pouring a few drops into the 
spoon, drank it herself with a rash determination to know, 
• if possible, what the drug was before she administered it. 
It left a strong taste of opium in her mouth ; and, quick as 
thought, she remembered that morphine was colorless, that 


60 


The Vial of White Medicine . 

a few drops would kill, and she had been directed to give 
that frail creature a teaspoonful. 

Mary Margaret shuddered from head to foot. The blood 
seemed curdling in her veins ; her plump fingers grew cold 
as she clasped the vial. How much had she drank ? W ould 
those few drops be her death ? No, no, they could not be 
enough. She felt sure that God would not let her perish 
there in the midst of her duty. 

“ Have you given her the medicine ? ” asked the hoarse 
voice again from the clouded corner. 

“Not — not yet. I — I am pouring it out,” was the reply, 
and setting down the vial, she hastily poured out some tea 
into another spoon and gave it to the patient, who smiled 
gratefully as the moisture crept through her lips. 

“ Has she drank it ? ” asked the nurse, starting up as Mary 
Margaret settled the invalid back upon her pillow. 

“You see!” answered Mary, pointing to the moist lips of 
the girl. 

The nurse pushed her away between the cots, saw the vial 
with its cork out and moisture about the neck, and her white 
lips broke into a half smile, so cold, so deadly, that Mary 
Margaret shrunk back as if a snake were creeping across 
her feet. 

Still the woman did not seem quite satisfied, but took up 
the spoon, out of which Mary Margaret had drank, and 
touched her tongue to the bowl. 

“ Oh ! ” she said, rather in a deep breath than with words, 
“ oh ! now watch, and I will go to bed a while. If she 
sleeps, let her! — if she wakes up, call me.” 

“And if she is worse, where can I find the doctor?” asked 
Mary, gazing wistfully at her enemy through the lamp-light, 
and shuddering at the strange sensations that she fancied to 
be creeping over her. “ The doctor, where is he ? ” 

“ Call me if you want any one. Bellevue doctors don’t 
come to the beck and call of their pauper patients.” 


61 


The? Vial of White Medicine . 

“ But I must have a doctor ! ” persisted Mary. 

“ Must ! ” echoed the woman, turning deadly white. 
“ Oh ! ” and with a slow, cat-like movement she crept back 
to the bed, lingered over the pillow an instant and disap- 
peared, carrying the vial of medicine with her. 

Poor Mary Margaret scarcely saw it. Her eyes were 
growing so heavy, and an oppressive languor weighed down 
her limbs. She forgot every thing, even the fair young 
mother, who opened her eyes and asked so meekly for drink 
again. All that the poor woman hoped for now was power 
to get back to her own pauper cot and die close to her baby. 
She thought nothing of the strange nursling then, for all 
the feeling left unnumbed in her heart turned to her own 
offspring. 

Half unconsciously she gave the invalid some drink, and 
then moved with slow, leaden steps across the floor. It 
seemed as if she had been walking miles when she reached 
the bed, and turned back the blankets with her heavy hand. 
The two infants were huddled together below the pillows. 
One was her own child : with that she wished to lie down 
and sleep ; but the other, it must not perish with her, some 
one must care for it, but who ? 

Heavier and heavier grew her brain; still, kind thoughts 
lingered there last. She took up the strange baby, stag- 
gered with it down the ward, and laid it softly into the fair 
bosom of the young girl but late so feverish and delirious. 

“ It must not starve, and it must not die,’’ said Mary Mar- 
garet, in her thick, fettered speech. “ Take care of it. I 
— I must take no baby but my own.” 

And with a still slower and more dragging step, Marga- 
ret went back to her cot, fell down, and became senseless as 
stone. 

The sick girl grew calm as Mary became more and more 
like the dead. Her slender arms clasped themselves like 
vine tendrils around the child. A smile stole over her 


62 


Early in the Morning . 

mouth, and a cool moisture crept, like dew upon the leaves 
of a lily, over her neck and forehead. With sweet, drowsy 
fondness, she. drew the little creature closer and closer to her 
bosom — gave out one long sigh of exquisite satisfaction, 
and murmured some words which sounded, in their sweet in- 
distinctness, like the cooing of a ring-dove. 

The fever had abated. That wicked nurse was struggling 
in vain for the sleep that had fallen so calmly on her in- 
tended victim. Thus w 7 ith bland, healthful life closing 
around her, the young creature was left to her pure mother- 
hood, dreaming that her own child had crept back close, 
close to her bosom, from which the pain was melting away 
in soft warm drops, which broke like pearls between the in- 
fant’s lips. 


CHAPTER IX. 

EARLY IN THE MORNING. 

E ARLY the next morning Jane Kelly came into the ward, 
pale and heavy-eyed, as if she had been watching all 
night. Her step was heavy and reluctant as she moved 
down between that double row of beds, glancing furtively 
over them toward a distant cot, which was that morning the 
only point of interest for her. As she drew near that bed, 
the woman grew pale and paler. She hesitated and turned 
aside ; now settling the blanket over some patient ; now 
stopping to move a pillow, but all the time drawing nearer 
and nearer to that one spot. 

At last she came to a bed where a woman lay with a 
child on her arm, in the deepest and most deathly slumber 
that ever fell upon a human being who lived to see the day- 
light again. The plump, round face was white as snow 
under the voluminous ruffles of a cap, quilled like a dahlia 


Early in the Morning . 63 

and radiating round her head like a sun-flower. Purple 
shadows lay all around her closed eyes, and gave a deathly 
hue to her lips, which were just ajar, revealing the edges of 
strong, white teeth Underneath. 

“What’s the matter here?” cried the terrified nurse, 
seizing Mrs. Dillon by the shoulders, and shaking her till 
the cap trembled in all its borders. 

Mary Margaret fell back heavily from those disturbing 
hands, but neither opened her eyes nor gave a struggle ; her 
head descended like a log to the pillow, and one hand dropped 
over the side of the couch heavily, like the hand of a dead 
person. 

Jane Kelly’s exclamation had disturbed some of the 
sleepers nearest to Mrs. Dillon’s bed. One or two started 
up and cried out, — 

“ What ’s the matter ? Dear me, what ’s the matter ? ” 

“Nothing is the matter!” answered the nurse curtly f 
“ only some sleep heavy and some don’t, that’s all.” v 

Then the sleepers settled down to rest again, and Jane, 
after placing her hand on the woman’s chest to be sure that 
her heart was stirring, went hurriedly down the ward, so 
frightened by what she had seen, that she was ready to rush 
upon anything that was to come. 

She found a lovely young face nestled close down to the 
head of an infant, pale, certainly, but with the flush which 
lies in the heart of a white rose just dawning on her cheek, 
and a smile hovering around her faintly parted lips. 

Again Kelly uttered a cry of surprise — hushed on the 
moment of its outbreak — she stood over the young mother 
frightened and pallid, with the upper lip lifted from her 
teeth, like that of a dog who longs to snarl aloud and dares 
not. She looked around to make sure that none of the 
patients were watching her, then bent her head close to that 
smiling mouth, and listened for the breath which was so 
hateful to her. 


64 


Early in the Morning . 

Yes, the girl breathed. Still the movement of her chest 
was almost imperceptible. The perfume of a flower could 
have been felt almost as distinctly as the respiration that 
kept the dew upon her lips. But JanePKelly was too wise 
in her experience not to know that this was a healthful 
sleep ; that the rich vitality of youth was there, and nothing 
baneful, as she had expected and hoped. The child stirred 
and dropped its little hand like a rose-leaf on that fair neck. 
Then the smile deepened, and the blue eyes opened. 

“ Oh, you* have n’t come to take him from me ! he has 
been so good all night. Let him stay, let him stay, nurse ! ” 

“ That will be as the doctor wishes, I reckon,” answered 
the nurse, in her worst mood, for she was greatly disturbed. 
“It is n’t that young fellow, let me tell you — this is one who 
won’t listen to no nonsense, if he thinks it is n’t good for you 
or the young one ; you won’t get leave to keep him now, I 
tell you.” 

“ But it is good for me, I am sure of that, and this poor 
little baby, too; see- how sweetly it sleeps.” 

Jane Kelly gave a sidelong look at the child, muttered 
something about the ridiculousness of setting children to 
take care of children, and flung herself away from the bed. 

Directly, Jane went again to the cot on which Mary 
Margaret Dillon was sleeping, what might prove the sleep 
of death. Seizing the woman by both shoulders, she half 
lifted her from the bed, and shook her vigorously. Putting 
her mouth down to the sealed ear, she shouted forth a fierce 
oath that aroused every patient in the ward, but had no 
effect upon the sleeper. 

Jane Kelly was terribly frightened. It might not be 
long before the doctor would come in, for some of the 
patients were in great danger, and he usually visited such 
very early in the morning. If he found Mrs. Dillon still 
insensible, and so deathly white, an explanation would be 
demanded, and Jane Kelly trembled to think of the result. 


65 


Early in the Morning. 

This apprehension made the nurse desperate. All her 
efforts had failed to reach the sealed senses of the woman 
whose sleep threatened to be eternal. As a last resort, she 
snatched up the child, and shook it till its teeth would have 
chattered had such appendages been yet given to its mouth ; 
as it was, the little fellow set up a yell that would have done 
credit to the wildest pappoose of the wildest Indian that 
ever lived — a yell that reached the locked brain of the 
woman, and set the warm motherly blood to heating in her 
heart. The deathly look went out from Mary Margaret’s 
face. The lips began to stir ; her heavy eyelids were slowly 
lifted ; she turned over on her side, muttering, — 

“ Was it the mother’s darlint?” 

I think Jane Kelly must have pinched young Ireland 
directly after this, for he set up another war-whoop, and 
this time Mary Margaret started up in her bed and began 
to feel blindly around for the child, muttering to herself, 
and rocking to and fro ; a moment after, she fell upon her 
side, and sunk into a -sound sleep again, from which all the 
efforts of the nurse could not arouse her. 

In less than an hour, the doctor did, in fact, come into 
the ward, in order to visit one or two patients who required 
constant attention. It would have been easy enough for 
Jane Kelly to have concealed the condition of Mrs. Dillon ; 
but young Ireland happened to choose that moment for a 
new outbreak. He w T as getting hungry and did not like 
the' state of things in his neighborhood at all, and there was 
no way of appeasing him short of absolute choking, a pro- 
cess Jane Kelly longed to put in force, but dared not. 

“ What is the matter here?” inquired the doctor; “ why 
don’t the woman take care of her child? This noise will 
play the mischief with my patients. Wake her up, nurse, 
and have the little fellow silenced.” 

“ But I can’t ; she won’t wake up,” said Jane desperately, 

“ Won’t wake up; why?” said the doctor, stepping close 
4 


66 The Velvet Prayer-Book and its Contents. 

to Mrs. Dillon’s cot. “ Dear me, what is this? Has she taken 
anything ? ” 

“Yes,” said Jane Kelly, with prompt falsehood, “brandy. 
She had visitors yesterday. I found the bottle under her 
bed empty.” 

“ Brandy, and this comes of it. There must be bad man- 
agement here, Jane Kelly.” 

Jane made no answer, but busied herself in arranging the 
room. 


CHAPTER X. 

THE VELVET PRAYER-BOOK AND ITS CONTENTS. 

A FTER the doctor had gone, Jane Kelly was putting 
fresh straw into the bed on which that young mother 
had died only a few hours before. She found a prayer-book 
bound in purple velvet, such as fanciful young girls carry to 
church, hid away in the loose straw she was throwing out. 
Jane instantly seized upon the book and began searching it 
leaf by leaf, in hopes of finding some secret hoard of money 
concealed in its pages. She was disappointed in this, but 
she found a sealed letter which keenly excited her curiosity, 
for it was directed to a name that she recognized. A slip 
of paper was folded around this letter, on which was written 
a wild and blotted request that it should be forwarded at 
once, whatever the writer’s fate may be. The name on this 
slip of paper was that which had been placed on the wooden 
tablet at the head of that young mother’s cot. More than 
this, while searching further among the blank leaves, the 
woman found a name written that startled her a little, and 
suggested a train of thought which held her inactive for 
some minutes. 


The Velvet Prayer-Booh and its Contents . 67 

This name belonged to a lady, well-known and of high 
standing in all the charitable circles of the city. Jane 
Kelly had seen it many a time, heading committees for 
calico balls, charity concerts, and all those religious and 
philanthropic devices by which money is lured into merce- 
nary or merciful channels, as the case may be, by a union 
of fashion and philanthropy. 

Jane Kelly found this lady’s name in a blank leaf of the 
prayer-book, which from its date must have been a Christmas 

present. Mrs. Cordelia Judson to The name written 

here was not that printed on the wooden tablet, but that did 
not disturb the train of Kelly’s conjectures*; nothing was 
more likely than that the real name should be in the book, 
and a false one given to the tablet. 

These shrewd calculations occupied the woman all the 
time she was filling the bed. When the last wisp of straw was 
crowded into the tick, she sat down upon it, carefully opened 
the imperfectly sealed letter, and read it from beginning to 
end. When she folded it again, it was slowly, and that hard 
face had softened with a touch of womanly pity. 

“ Yes, it shall go to him,” she muttered, folding the slip of 
paper around the letter ; “ such men deserve stabbing to the 
heart. It shall go, but I must have a copy if I have to 
sit up till morning to write it. If that lady is what I think, 
.it will bring in money. Oh, yes! I will keep a copy of this 
letter; poor thing! poor thing! I wish it had been the other. 
After all, shall I give the copy to that old Frenchwoman? 
No, no ; she haggles ; — I will take it to the other.” After this, 
Kelly gave herself up to such deep thought that she remained 
full half an hour sitting upon that straw bed, gathering up 
her knees with both hands, and ruminating on the things 
she had found ; over and over again, she counted the prob- 
abilities of making this discovery valuable to herself. How 
came that book there, hid away in the straw bed of a 
hospital ? Had Mrs. Judson given it to the girl, or had she 


68 The Velvet Prayer-Book and its Contents . 

stolen it from the person to whom it had been presented by 
this proud lady ? It was no uncommon thing for the in- 
mates of that institution to have prayer-books given by 
ladies as lofty in position as Mrs. Judson, but those books 
were cheap things from the Bible-House, printed on paltry 
paper, and bound in spotted leather that made the fingers 
shrink from touching it. 

Plenty of such poverty-stricken books were lying about 
in the wards all ‘the time; but this was a very different 
affair. The book was almost new, the velvet fresh and bright 
as the sunny side of a plum. The clasp seemed to be of 
pure gold, and the paper was thick, smooth, and of a rich 
creamy white that met the touch like satin. These ladies did 
not write their names, and call the paupers “ dear friends ” 
when they distributed their pious offerings to the inmates of 
the hospital. 

Such was the burden 0 / Jane Kelly’s thoughts, as she sat 
with her eyes on the ground, and her feet half buried in the 
refuse straw just emptied from the bed. 

She got up at last, folded the book and letter in an old 
pocket-handkerchief, and went to work again, still thought- 
ful, and revolving something in her mind. 

“ If the girl stole it,” she said, talking to herself, as she 
sometimes did when no one was by to listen, — “if she stole 
it, why, then, the lady will be glad to get it back again, and 
no harm done, or good, either, except it may be a dollar-bill 
or so on my side of the reckoning. If it really belonged to 
the poor creature, and, after all, she looked and talked like 
a lady, this rich madam must have known her well, and 
there is something at the bottom of it all which may bring 
lots of dollar-bills. At any rate, there ’s no harm in trying. 
That letter gives me courage. I ’ll try it, anyhow.” 

Jane Kelly now fell to her work with vigor, and directly 
where the death-couch of that young girl had been, a cot, 
piled high and evened down under a coarse white counter- 


The Velvet Prayer-Book and its Contents . 69 

pane, stood ghostly and cold, like an enormous grave just 
sheeted with snow ; and all the ward took that air of chill 
cleanliness which, in a large room full of human beings, is 
necessary and admirable, but bleak as a desert. 

It was a little remarkable that Jane was constantly going 
to and fro from the spot where she happened to be at work 
to Mrs. Dillon’s bed ; that she sometimes felt her pulse, and 
once or twice, during the morning, took up young Ireland, 
and fed him from a bottle with her own hands. 

It was also singular that she never went near the younger 
woman, and seemed shy of even looking at her. People are 
sometimes seized with repulsion against persons about 
whom they have meditated great injury. Was this the 
case with Jane Kelly? 

It was deep in the day before Mary Margaret was aroused ; 
but the lusty cries of her child at last broke the leaden sleep 
that was upon her, and she sat up in bed, dazed and bewil- 
dered, wondering what it was that made her eyes so heavy, 
and had left that throbbing pain in her temples. 

She took up the child, with a dreary sense of -weight, and 
once or twice almost dropped him from her arms from the 
heavy dulness that would not be shaken off. 

“ I’ve been draimin’ sure,” she said, looking about for 
the child. “ Arrah, here he is, wide-awake, wid his fist 
doubled under his cheek, and his eyes smothered wid the 
tears, bad luck to me!” 

All at once she seemed to remember something; for, 
dropping the child on the bed, she got off at the side, and, 
with her limbs trembling and her head reeling, went to 
the bed occupied by Catharine Lacy and the infant that 
had been lent to her. When she saw Catharine lying there, 
with a smile on her lips, and the babe sound asleep in her 
arms, the good woman gave a little shout, and fell down on 
her knees by the cot, exclaiming, “ Glory to God ! there she 
is to the fore ; I’ve been draiming. Glory ! amin ! ” 


70 The Velvet Prayer-Book and its Contents. 

“ What is it — what makes you so glad ? ” said a sweet 
voice from the bed. “ Oh, Mrs. Dillon, I have been sleeping 
so sweetly.” 

Mary Margaret did not seem to hear this. The sting of 
some sharp anxiety had aroused her for a moment; but 
when that was removed, the heavy, slumberous feeling came 
back. Lifting herself from the bed, she moved toward her 
own cot, swaying heavily to and fro as she walked ; but all 
the while she was muttering thanksgiving for some great 
mercy received or danger escaped. Directly she reached 
her own bed, Mary Margaret fell asleep again, taking care 
of her child dreamily, and with her eyes now and then un- 
closing when he grew absolutely impatient. 

It was the sudden appearance of Jane Kelly that thor- 
oughly aroused her. Had a rattlesnake forced itself across her 
bed, it is doubtful if she would have^shrunk from it more 
nervously. The sight of that face brought all the transac- 
tions of the night before to her mind, and she called out, 
“ Don’t come near me ! Don’t touch me ! ” 

“ Who wants to touch you, woman, after a drunken sleep 
like that? Be quiet now, or I’ll have you turned out of the 
hospital'.” 

Mary Margaret gazed on the woman in speechless aston- 
ishment. “ Drunken ! — me ! me!” 

Here the poor woman burst into a passion of angry, fierce 
crying, for the insult of that insinuation stung her like a 
wasp. 

“ Yes, woman, you, you! The doctor saw you; all the 
women in the ward saw you, lying there dead in for it. If 
it had n’t been for me, you would have overlaid that cub 
of yours and smothered him. ; Don’t look at me in that 
way. You ought to hide your head.” 

Mary Margaret’s eyes were wide open now. She charged 
with drinking — she, who never touched a drop year in and 
year out, not even when Dillon brought his friends to their 


The Velvet Prayer- Booh and its Contents . 71 

home, or took her out to a wake. The charge was abomi- 
nable. 

“ J ane Kelly,” she said, rubbing the tears from her eyes ; 
“ you know that there is n’t a word of truth in what you say. 
It was n’t brandy, but something worse, ten thousand times 
worse, that I took.” 

“ And what was that ? ” inquired Jane, placing her arms 
akimbo and taking altogether a fighting attitude, which 
rather terrified Mary Margaret, for she was not strong 
enough for a combat, had any idea of the kind been in her 
thought. 

“ I don’t know what it was, but there was morphine in it 
and it put me into a sleep that was like dying.” 

Jane Kelly laughed violently, holding her sides and 
appealing to the women around her with repeated nods of 
the head. 

“ Morphine, was it ? ha! ha! and where did you get it? 
there now, where did you get it ? ” 

“ I got it from the vial you put by that young crathur 
there, and told me to give her a taespoonful every once in 
a while. White it was, and I have the taste of it in my 
mouth this minute.” 

Jane Kelly darted down to the young woman’s bed and 
brought back a vial half full of some red liquid. 

“ White, is it? ” she cried, holding the vial up to the gen- 
eral gaze, “ and morphine ? ha! ha ! — just a taste of innocent 
paregoric, that would n’t hurt the baby in her arms, if she 
fed it to him by the teaspoonful. Why there is n’t an 
hour’s sleep in the whole of it. No, no, I’ll show you where 
she got her morphine.” 

Here Jane made a dive under Mrs. Dillon’s bed, and came 
forth w T ith a junk bottle, winch she shook triumphantly in 
sight of all the curious eyes drawn upon her by this discus- 
sion. “ Empty ! ” she exclaimed, “ not a drop left. This woman 
drinks morphine by the bottleful ! ha-ha ! by the bottleful ! ” 


72 The Velvet Prayer- Booh and its Contents. 

Here the young patient sat up in her bed and gazed upon 
the scene with disturbed eyes, — Jane Kelly with the bottle in 
her hand and a sneering laugh on her lips, Mrs. Dillon sit- 
ting on the side of her bed, crimson with anger, her face 
wet with tears, and her cap-borders drooping like dahlias 
after a two days’ rain ; half the patients in the ward leaning 
upon their elbows and listening with eager curiosity. This 
was what the young creature saw. 

“No, no,” she cried, and her sweet voice ran through the 
discord like the chime of a silver bell stealing through a 
clash of iron. “ She did drink something from the vial ; I 
saw her. I know it was from the vial, and I know that it was 
white ; you took that vial away, Kelly, and put the other in 
its place ; my eyes were almost shut, but I saw you.” 

Mary Margaret clasped her hands in an outbreak of 
gratitude, and holding them up called out, — 

“ Do ye hear that now ? Has n’t the holy Virgin sent down 
one of her angels to confound yer wid yer own lies, Jane 
Kelly. Now just put that bottle away and niver show the 
likes again — taking away a respectable married woman’s 
character. Put it away, put it away, an’ maybe the holy 
Mother may give me grace ter forgive yez entirely, but don’t 
let the old mon know what yez been at, or he’d break ivery 
bone in yer body and think it a pleasure.” 

With this, Mary Margaret, satisfied that her vindication 
was complete, curled herself into the bed, took young Ireland 
to her motherly bosom, and told the rest of her griefs to him 
in sobs and whispers, w T hich he was far too busy to care much 
about — the spalpeen! 

The exertion the young patient had made, left her panting 
for breath, while drops of weakness gathered upon her fore- 
head like rain upon a lily. 

Jane Kelly meantime left the ward, swinging the empty 
bottle by the neck. 


Jane Kelly Finds an Old Acquaintance . 


73 


CHAPTER XL 

JANE KELLY FINDS AN OLD ACQUAINTANCE. 

T HAT night a house on Murry Hill was lighted up with 
more than usual splendor, not exactly for a party, for 
then those broad stone steps would have been carpeted to the 
street, and a sound of music would have been heard by 
every passer-by. Still there were sufficient indications of 
company ; all the front windows were ablaze with light. The 
large gas lanterns on each side the steps flooded the 
pavement with their radiance. The soft hum of voices 
came faintly through draperies of lace and curtains of satin, 
and there seemed to be a good deal of commotion in the 
basement, quite enough to justify the idea of a large party 
gathered socially. 

All this troubled Jane Kelly, who stood by the stone rail- 
ing with the velvet prayer-book under her shawl, doubtful 
whether she had not better put off her errand to another day, 
than risk a denial at the door. Jane was not a woman to 
hesitate over small difficulties. She was seized with curiosity 
to know what was going on in that lofty mansion, and went 
down the basement-steps as if she belonged there. 

A sharp pull at the bell brought a servant to the hall- 
door, a woman-servant, for the men were all up-stairs, dressed 
like ministers, and with white gloves on their hands. 

“Why, Ellen Burns! is it you?” 

“ Hush.” 

The servant lifted up both hands with something like 
terror, when she uttered this word, and looked over her 
shoulder to make- certain that no one was listening. 

“ Come in,” she said, in a whisper ; “ but not one word 
about the hospital ; I should lose my place if it were known 
that I had ever been a nurse there.” 


74 Jane Kelly Finds an Old Acquaintance . 

“Is the lady as particular as that?” answered Jane, 
sinking her voice and slipping inside the door. “ Well, well, 
never fear, I know how to keep a close mouth, you know that 
of old.” 

“Yes, yes, I know, — step in here, — you have come at a 
fortunate time ; two of the girls are up-stairs, and the men 
are all so busy that we can have the parlor here almost to 
ourselves.” 

Jane slipped through the door opened for her, and found 
herself in a room that struck her as sumptuous. 

“ Won’t the lady come down and catch us in her parlor ?” 
she asked a little anxiously. 

Ellen laughed, and throwing herself on a sofa, made room 
for Jane by her side. 

“She come here! Why, this is the servants’ parlor, Jane 
Kelly; we have nice times here, I tell you, especially when 
she is away at the watering-places ; — not that we stay here 
much, why should we when the drawing-room is more con- 
\Miient, — such balls and parties as we have! such wihe! to 

say nothing of , well, no matter. Tell me what brought 

you here, of all places in the world ? ” 

“ No, tell me more about your way of living. It must be 
sumptuous ; I should like it.” 

“ Like it ! of course you would ; double the wages you get, 
and half the work.” 

“No vacancy? One would not get in with the help of a 
friend like you, Ellen. I should like it, you know.” 

“ Impossible,” said Ellen, firmly. 

“ I thought so. Well, never mind. You were speaking 
about parties and wine — champagne, perhaps?” 

“ Plenty of it — like water, in fact — that is, when she’s 
away.” 

“ But how do you get it ? ” 

“ She takes the keys of the wine-cellar, of course, but 
careful as a woman can be, such things will sometimes be 


75 


Jane Kelly Finds an Old Acquaintance . 

mislaid or lost. Hers got lost one day. She had to get a 
locksmith and have another made. Singular, was n’t it ? but 
weeks after I found that very key in my pocket.” 

“ Very singular,” said Jane demurely. 

“ Is n’t it, now ? but our little parties have gone off splen- 
didly ever since.” 

“ I should think so,” said Jane ; “ I only wonder you 
never thought to invite me.” 

“ Could n’t,” answered Ellen, shaking her head. “ The 
aristocracy would have turned up its nose clear through the 
basement. Nothing but first-class ladies and gentlemen get 
into these little swarrys, — ladies’ maids, footmen, and so 
on, — awfully rechercher , I can tell you. Why, some of us 
wear real diamonds ; I don’t, for my duties are down-stairs, 
but you may bet on it the girls that take care of their 
mistress’s things shine now and then.” 

“ Keal diamonds,” said Jane Kelly, feeling hastily in her 
pocket, and drawing out a paper box which she opened, 
“ something like that, maybe.” 

“ Goodness gracious ! where did you get it ? ” cried the 
girl, snatching at the diamond ear-ring, which flashed and 
quivered in the gas-light. ' 

“ At any rate, it ’s my own and borrowed from no mistress, 
you may stake your life on that — so you see that I can cut 
a splash when I want to.” 

“ Let me see the other,” said Ellen, reaching forth her 
hand toward the box. 

“ Oh, they are exactly alike, of course,” answered Jane, 
crowding a tuft of pink cotton wool into the box ; “ mates, 
you know, and worth lots of chink.” 

“ How did you come by them ? now, tell me.” 

“ Never you mind ; they belong to me, and I can wear 
them before the Queen of England if I like.” 

“ Well, you have been lucky ! ” 

“ Some folks are lucky one way, and some another, — you 


76 


Jane Kelly Finds an Old Acquaintance . 

are great on wine and aristocratic company — I — no 
matter about me,: — I’m not good enough for these little 
swarrySi” 

“ Oh, but I did n’t say that. You always was a stylish 
girl, Jane, and those rings are sumpt’us. With them in your 
ears, and coming as my friend, what could be said agin you ? 
Got other things to match, I dare say.” 

“ Well, yes,” answered Jane, after a moment’s hesitation, 
“ or that which will get ’em.” 

Ellen put a finger to her lips and fell into thought. Jane 
watched her with side glances, while she packed away her 
ear-ring in the pink cotton. 

“ I should be glad to have you come like a princess — you 
could look it, Jane Kelly. I’ve often heard young doctors 
say how handsome you was ; among all us nurses, you always 
would cut the widest swath. If you’ll promise to sweep over 
some of these topping ladies’ maids and outshine ’em out 
and out, I’ll get you an invite to our next.” 

“I’ll do it,” said Jane with emphasis. “Trust me, I’ll 
walk right straight over ’em.” ' 

“ That is just what I shall glory in. O Maria ! how you 
startled me ; this is my friend, Miss Kelly, just got in from 
New Haven, where she has been living with, with — ” 

“The president of the College — lovely family,” said 
Jane. 

The young person thus addressed put one hand into the 
pocket of her dainty white apron, and dropped a little 
curtsy which had plenty of reservations in it. Then she 
went to a glass and arranged the hair that rolled tightly 
back from her forehead, patting it coquettishly on each tem- 
ple with her hand. 

“I — I am glad to see your friend, Ellen, though just this 
minute it is the least mite of a disappointment. Mr. Simp- 
son asked me to be in the parlor about this time. He will 
be bringing things down, you know, and I was going to ask, 


77 


Jane Kelly Finds an Old Acquaintance . 

as the greatest favor, that you would take my place up-stairs 
awhile. I hope your friend will excuse me mentioning it.” 

“ Don’t let me keep you,” said Jane, rising with the air 
of an emp ess. 

“ Could n’t you go up-stairs with me?” said Ellen, greatly 
impressed by this grand air. It is only to sit there while 
I get the ladies’ things as they come up.” 

Jane hesitated. She saw that her chances of an interview 
"with Mrs. Judson were very small, but still the temptation 
to see more of the house had its force. 

“ Oh, don’t let me drive your friend away ! ” said the 
girl they called Maria, settling her apron with great nicety. 
“ I would not have spoken for the world if I had dreamed 
of such a thing.” 

“ I am not going away, thank you,” answered Jane, with 
a fling of the head which delighted her friend. “Ellen 
wants me to go up-stairs with her, and I ’m agoing.” 

Now, the girl Maria did not care a fig where either Ellen 
or her friend went, so long as they left the servants’ parlor 
to her and Mr. Simpson, who had with his own white-gloved 
hands put away some dainties for this special occasion. 
These dainties the two had no idea of sharing with any 
one, much less had Maria the least intention of giving a 
portion of Mr. Simpson’s society to either of the two fe- 
males whom, much to her disgust, she had found in occupa- 
tion when she came into the parlor. 

“ Dear me, I’m so afraid I ’ve disturbed you ! had n’t the 
least intention of doing it ; perhaps I had better go up-stairs 
again.” 

Here Maria seated herself in a rocking-chair, shook out 
her dress, made herself generally comfortable, and concealed 
a yawn behind her hand. 

“ That ’s just like her,” said Ellen, as she went up-stairs 
with her guest. “ She thinks there is nobody on earth but 
herself ; just as if Mr. Simpson ever asked her ; she don’t 
wait for that, let me tell you.” 


78 The Conference in Mrs. Judson’s Chamber . 

“ I should like to have her for a patient, that ’s all,” said 
J ane Kelly, giving her hand a fierce grip. “ W ould n’t I 
let her beg for drink ? Oh, no ! ” 

“ Hush ! ” whispered Ellen ; “ we are close by the dressing- 
room — some one may be there.” 

Jane became silent on the instant, and walking almost on 
tiptoe, followed her friend along the upper hall. 


CHAPTER XII. 

THE CONFERENCE IN MRS. JUDSON’s CHAMBER. 

E LLEN opened a door at the upper end of the hall, and 
Jane Kelly found herself in a spacious chamber, bril- 
liantly lighted, with a broad, tall mirror rising from floor to 
ceiling, ' and a Psyche glass swinging between gilded sup- 
porters, in which she saw herself from head to foot. 

Several easy-chairs, shrouded in white linen, stood about 
the room, and a bed, canopied with lace and crimson satin, 
w r as laden down with loose garments, which betokened the 
presence of ladies enough for a large dinner-party. 

On the dressing-table, toilet articles lay about as if but 
recently used. Combs and ivory -handled brushes, carved 
into richness, were scattered over the white marble, and on 
a table close by, an elaborate dressing-case stood open with 
all its crystal flasks and cases exposed, glittering with gold, 
and, in some instances, surmounted with exquisite cameos^ 
that might have befitted a lady’s necklace. 

Jane Kelly, after gazing about the room in wonder at its - 
costliness, went up to this dressing-case and began to handle ' 
the dainty articles it contained. Ellen turned upon her' 1 
sharply enough, — 


The Conference in Mrs. Judson’s Chamber . 79 

“ Don’t/’ she said. “You will get me into trouble.” 

Jane’s eyes flashed ; she settled the flask which she had 
been examining into its place with an angry jerk. “ Are 
you afraid that I shall steal something?” she demanded 
rudely. “ If you are, say so.” 

“ There now, you are going off into one of your old tem- 
pers, Jane Kelly. I a’n’t afraid of anything of the sort; 
but you are n’t used to handling such things ; why, one of 
them bottles is worth two months of your wages.” 

“ Well, let her keep ’em ; I have no use for such things ; 
would n’t take ’em for a gift if it was n’t to sell ’em again, not 
I. Things that one can wear are worth having; but I 
wouldn’t give shucks for a load of gimcracks like these. 
Who wants ’em to dress with ? ” 

After expressing her disdain of Mrs. Judson’s dressing- 
case, Kelly turned her back upon it, and took a full-length 
portrait of herself in the mirror. 

“Well,” she said, throwing the shawl around her, and 
shaking out the ribbons of her bonnet, “ I think the woman 
in that glass is quite as good-looking as that whiflet down- 
stairs, w T ith her white apron, and her hair combed back like 
a Chinaman. How I wanted to shake her.” 

“Now, if I was you — ” said Ellen, beginning to feel un- 
comfortable about her guest. 

“ Well, what if you was me?” 

“ I would just take off my bonnet and shawl, so that the 
ladies, if any of ’em come up, would not think it strange. 
I will hang them up in the hall-closet, and give you a nice 
apron to put on — that is, if you have a mind to stay longer.” 

Jane did not take the hint given in these words. She had 
made up h*r mind to stay and get an interview with the 
lady of the house, if possible. With this intent she took 
off her bonnet and shawl, gave them to Ellen, and invested 
herself in the dainty white apron which her friend brought 
from another room. 


80 The Conference in Mrs. Judson’s Chamber . 

“Now,” she said, with a mocking smile, “you needn’t 
fidget yourself any more about me. I ’m neither going to 
steal nor disgrace you. I was n’t brought up so deep in the 
woods as- you seem to think — had more education than a 
dozen such creatures as that down-stairs, and know more 
than fifty of ’em rolled into one. Now sit down here, and 
let us two have a talk.” 

Ellen drew a seat close to the cosy chair in which Jane 
Kelly placed herself. 

“ Well, what shall we talk about — old times?” 

“Old times — not a bit of it; the very name of that hos- 
pital makes me sick. I want to get out of it, and mean to. 
No, no ; tell me about your own way of living. What kind 
of a lady is this Mrs. Judson ? ” 

“ Oh,” said Ellen, “ she ’s one of the nicest ladies in the 
w r orld, of course.” 

“ Why of course ? ” 

“ Because I live with her, and she pays me good wages. 
I ’m not going to run dow r n the bridge that carries me over.” 

“ Not in a general way ; but to me, just for the sake of 
telling the truth to an old friend, you know.” 

“Well, if you must know, she’s an old cat.” 

“ Exactly,” said Jane, with a nod of the head. 

“ One of your charitable women.” 

' “ Gives away prayer-books and Bibles, no doubt.” 

“ Plenty of them ; tracts, too ; but the Bible-House always 
finds the books, make sure of that.” 

“Isn’t the woman to give away velvet-bound prayer- 
books or things of that kind at her own expense, ah ? ” 

“What, she? Well, yes, if the person she gave ’em to 
was rich enough not to care for them. On Christmas-day I 
have known her do such things.” 

“ When?” 

• “Why, what do you care? She won’t give you one, I’ll 
be bound.” > 'm-- 


The Conference in Mrs. Judson's Chamber . 81 

“ I was n’t thinking of that — only talking for talk’s sake.” 

“ Promiscuous ? ” 

“ Exactly. Now tell me, just for fun, you know, who did 
she ever give a prayer-book to ? ” 

Ellen drew her chair closB to Jane, and spoke in a 
low voice. 

“ That ’s a family secret, Jane Kelly, and you must not 
ask me about it.” 

“A family secret; just the thing — and not tell mel 
That is n’t like you, Ellen ; such old friends as we have 
been. Did n’t I always keep your little affairs close?” 

“ I know ; but one word about this would cost me my 
place.” 

“ But who ’s going to say the word ? Not Jane Kelly, 
you may be bound.” 

“ No, I could trust you ; but what good would there be in 
telling ? ” 

“True enough,” said Jane, leaning back in her chair. 
“I don’t suppose there is anything to tell. Houses like 
this are always stupid places for a clever girl to live in. 
At the hospital one has variety, and can boss it over the 
women. I might have known that you had nothing to tell.” 

“But I have — only it’s dangerous. Bend your head 
close, J ane, and I ’ll tell you all about it, — enough to make 
you cry.” 

Jane turned her head, and Ellen stooped toward her, 
speaking low and eagerly. If Jane was interested, she only 
gave indications of it now and then by a brief question. 

“And she did not know where the girl went — has no 
idea about her?” 

“No, she hasn’t; and it troubles her — my! how it does 
trouble her. When they come, there’ll be questions she 
won’t know how to answer. I would n’t be in her place for 
both your diamond ear-rings.” 

“Has she tried to find her?” 

§ 


82 


Mrs. Judson Distributes the Funds. 


“ Of course she has, but quietly, you know. Had a de- 
tective here one day up in her own room. Thought we ser- 
vants did not know ; but there ’s nothing going on that we 
do not understand.” 

“ Exactly ! ” said Jane Kelly, leaning back in her chair 
as if tired of the subject. “ Now tell me who are the people 
down stairs ? ” 

“ Oh, it’s a meeting of the Society — the annual meeting. 
Quite a mission — fashionable people from the Hill, and 
pious people from the side-streets — come early and go home 
by eleven. They are likely to be upon us any minute.” 

“Well, what am I to-do when they come?” inquired 
Jane. 

“ Oh, be ready to put on their cloaks, and hand pins as 
they want them. It’s only the Murry-Hillers that will 
want attention — the others wear over-shoes, and put them 
on with their own hands. I never offer to do it for them , at 
any rate.” 

“ Hush ! ” said Jane ; “ they are coming now.” 


CHAPTER XIII. 

MRS. JUDSON DISTRIBUTES THE FUNDS. 

mHE party down-stairs, though considered by the lady of 
X the house as an unceremonious affair, proved in every 
way successful. A great deal of philanthropy had been dis- 
cussed, with the terrapin and chicken-salad at the supper-table. 
At each stage of the refreshments some narrator reached a 
mission station in India, or descanted on the enormous good 
some female enthusiast had done in travelling twice to 
Jerusalem and back again. These things, it is true, were in 


Mrs. Judson Distributes the Funds . 83 • 

many instances whispered over in the sweetest of low voices, 
after a fashion that might have been mistaken for flirtations 
in persons of less exalted piety ; but no suspicion of that kind 
could rest here; the very looking-glasses in that superb 
drawing-room would have veiled their faces from a reflec- 
tion so undignified and improper. Early that week, there 
had been a grand charity ball at the Opera-House, and all 
the ladies who had acted as patronesses were expecting a 
division of the spoils in bulky rolls of bank-notes to be dis- 
tributed by each one at her own especial pleasure. These 
ladies were mostly from the highest fashionable circles; 
persons who loved to play lady-bountiful with other people’s 
money, and be glorified therefor, as if the thing had been a 
real charity; and why not? The Opera-House had trem- 
bled from floor to dome under the tread of worldly dancers, 
from whom so much money had been rescued, like brands 
from the burning. Even the religious women, who repre- 
sented various moral societies in that room, admitted this. 
Why should they hesitate to distribute it among their own 
humble followers, and receive gratitude therefor. Money 
snatched from the Evil One must be doubly grateful to the 
Lord. 

There was Mrs. Brown, a shining light in “ The Society for 
the Suppression of Vice.” Mrs. Green, who headed a Home 
Mission; and Mrs. Ward, a lady who could deliver more 
tracts in a given number of hours, than any other female 
known to the Society ; besides lesser lights who hummed and 
smiled and buzzed about these luminaries, like moths around a 
candle, to say nothing of some half dozen very silent and sub- 
dued men who belonged to the domestic circle of these ladies, 
and watched them afar off, without having any great desire 
to come nearer, or claim the glory of one common name. 

Mrs. Judson herself was a magnificent type of this class ; 
a pillar of strength — the salt of the earth — an angel of 
mercy, and all that sort of thing, was the stately lady of that 


84 Mrs. Judson Distributes the Funds. 

stately house. No wonder her followers thought so, for she 
moved among them like an empress, subdued and thought- 
ful over the shortcomings of her fellow-creatures. The 
heavy moire-antique had a solemn rustle in it, and the filmy 
bow that should have fallen like a gossamer on her head, 
looked stiff and hard when it came in contact with her face. 
In her person this lady embodied the two social elements 
that surrounded her. She was religiously fashionable and 
fashionably religious — stooping down to the good souls that 
worked out their own charities, with sublime condescension, 
and sweeping her transcendent virtues through the walks of 
the upper ten thousand with wonderful effect. This evening 
Mrs. Judson was surrounded by her worshippers from both 
stratas of social life ; no wonder her somewhat faded cheeks 
grew red and her bearing more stately. Was she not at 
that hour about to distribute a large sum of money partly 
w r on by her own great social influence ? Had not that in- 
congruous assembly mingled and harmonized around her 
from the cohesion of this gold, rescued from the wickedness 
of a ball-room ? In their pious enthusiasm had they not 
forced contributions from the worldliness of the worldly ? 
Heartless people had danced and flirted, drank wine and 
eaten daintily, that she might, carry the results to the foot- 
stool of the Lord, and with a hand on her heart, thank 
Him that she was not like those people. 

Mrs. Judson felt all this to the innermost recesses of her 
heart, as she stood at one end of the room conversing with 
Mrs. Brown, who was solemnly pleading the cause of her 
society, and impressing upon the lady-bountiful, that, inas- 
much as sin was the parent of want, the charity should fol- 
low it double-handed ; that, in wrestling with the monster, 
the strength of money must be added to the sanctity of 
prayer ; in fact, the lady insinuated that without money in 
this case, prayer had not the efficacy which could be de- 
sired. It was well enough for starving people to have food ; 


Mrs . Judson Distributes the Funds . 85 

she did not object to that, but how much more important it 
was that perishing souls should be rescued as brands from 
the burning. Ah, if Mrs. Judson could only see what the 
Society had gone through : the depths of sin to which they 
had descended in search of souls ; the trouble they had ex- 
perienced in reforming them sufficiently for a glowing re- 
port, and the grief with which they had seen them fall 
back ; still, there was one thing encouraging. These back- 
sliders could generally be depended upon to reform again 
about the time a new report was demanded by the country 
members, and, as names were owned very promiscuously, 
that document was usually full of promise, hope, and satis- 
factory words. Still, the great need was money — money. 
Mrs. Brown only wished that she had eloquence necessary 
for a thorough understanding of the good her Society had 
already done. 

Here the two ladies were joined by Mrs. Brown’s hus- 
band, a tall, thin man, with weak eyes, and an air of sub- 
serviency that would have been edifying had Mrs. Judson 
been a woman worthy of human worship. 

“You were speaking of our own little mission, my love,” 
said the husband, deprecatingly. “ Speaking with your own 
unvarying self-abnegation — always her way, dear madam. 
In order to know what that lovely woman is capable of, you 
should be with her night and day, as I am, in her laboring 
among the poor, fallen creatures, who often give back revil- 
ing for mercy. Working in ^gason and out of season, wak- 
ing up in the night and weeping floods of precious tears 
over the sins of her fellow-creatures. Ah ! madam, to know 
her, you should be her shadow as I am.” 

If Mrs. Judson had been capable of enjoying the ridicu- 
lous, she might have laughed heartily at this harangue 
which was measured off exactly as Mr. Brown would have 
preached a sermon. 

“My dear, you are too enthusiastic,” interposed Mrs. 


86 


Mrs. Judson Distributes the Funds. 


Brown, tightening the elastic of her glove ; “ all that I can 
do will be but a drop in the bucket — an humble instrument, 
madam, seeking for the means of greater usefulness. It is 
painful, humiliating, that money should be so needed in the 
service of the Lord. I sometimes wonder how the apostles 
got along without it. It seems to me that no sinner will re- 
form without bringing a heavy expense on the Society. 
Then it costs so much to bring them back when they return 
to the mire after we have brought them out, and made -them 
clean.” 

“ Ah ! ” said Mr. Brown, softly rubbing his palms together, 
“ the numbers that I can testify to, made holy and pure al- 
most by looking at this inestimable creature ! Madam, she 
is a woman'in ten thousand. I find her the meet companion 
for a perfect Christian.” 

“Mrs. Brown is too well known for me to question any- 
thing you can say in her favor,” answered Mrs. Judson, with 
lofty patronage in her look and manner. 

“But the importance of her mission over all others — the 
sacrifice, the prayers, the necessity for abundant means, 
every cent of which is sure to redound to the glory of God, 
through her hands, — have you thought prayerfully of that, 
dear lady ? ” continued Mr. Brown, growing sharp and eager 
in his eloquence. “ Why, one dollar in that woman’s hands 
will go further in saving immortal souls than ten, through 
some channels that I might speak of. Do not suppose I 
refer to the distribution of books or the writers thereof ; far 
be it from me to disparage the usefulness of Mrs. Brown’s 
friends, but when large sums of money are to be distributed 
• — hem, ahem ! ” 

Here Mr. Brown cut off his sentence ignominiously, for 
little Mrs. Green came bustling up, holding her handker- 
chief and fan as if they had been a bunch of tracts which 
she was bound to deliver at a moment’s notice. 

“Ah! here, you are, ardent in the good work, faithful 


Mrs. Judson Distributes the Funds . 


87 


among the faithful. Dear Mrs. Brown, what a treasure you 
have in this excellent man; some one to strengthen your 
hands, while I — ” 

Here Mrs. Green lifted two plump hands, cased in a pair 
of over-tight gloves, and shook her head mournfully, indi- 
cating a great loss, or want, perhaps both ; for the lady had 
lost her shadow two years before, and her grief had already 
reached the silver-gray stage of consolation. 

“ Yes,” replied Mrs. Brown, wringing her hands, “ I really 
should not know what to do without him. So occupied as 
I am with this heavenly work, there is great necessity that 
some trustworthy person should be at home and see to things 
there. Ah, yes ! Mr. Brown is invaluable.” 

Mr. Brown put one hand on his heart and bent nearly 
double in the humility of his gratitude. 

“ See her ! hear her ! ” he said ; “ always depreciating her- 
self and exalting others. If ever there was a pattern, Mrs. 
Judson, a pattern, — well, my dear, I forbear; the blushes 
on that cheek shall always be sacred to your husband. I 
forbear.” 

Here Mr. Brown waved his handkerchief twice while 
lifting it to his face, and retreated gracefully, walking back- 
ward. 

“ Ah ! ” whimpered Mrs. Green, “ it would be such a pleas- 
ure to witness a scene like this but for the memories it 
brings. There was a time when I, even I, — but the thought 
is too much, excuse me.” 

Here the -little woman drd#a tiny handkerchief from her 
pocket ; but as neither of the ladies seemed much impressed, 
thought better of it, and did not cry at all. If Mr. Brown 
had remained, perhaps it might have been otherwise. 

“ Private griefs, however acute, must give way to public 
duties. Mrs. Judson, you will never believe how many 
thousands and thousands of tracts I have delivered from 
door to door when my heart was swelling with anguish. 
It was a relief; yes, I must confess, it was a relief.” 


88 


Mrs. Judson Distributes the Funds . 


Mrs. Green unfolded her little handkerchief, and shook 
it out as if she still meditated a few tears ; but Mrs. Brown 
took her up with such vigor that she forgot all about it. 

“ You are right; such duties are a relief. But when you 
have money to raise, applications for help crowding on you, 
obligations to take up, in short, when you are called upon to 
accomplish a great work with insufficient means, as I was 
about to explain to Mrs. Judson, there is great need of 
Christian fortitude to carry one through.” 

“But I do have such trouble, madam,” answered Mrs. 
Green, firing up in behalf of her especial mission. “You 
don’t suppose that tracts are printed without money. Why, 
this moment our Society is, in debt, kept back from entire 
usefulness, for the want of means; we are poor, absolutely 
poor ; but for the generous aid we expect from this charity 
ball of which Mrs. Judson is a patroness, and, I must say, 
an ornament, we should have been dreadfully crippled.” 

Here Mrs. Brown seated herself and used her fan with 
emphasis. 

“Really,” she said, looking at Mrs. Judson, “the cause 
of the Lord is beset with difficulties. It seems to me that 
every society in New York, chartered or private, is coming 
upon us. At this rate, fifty balls would hardly count I 
am discouraged.” 

Mrs. Green flushed scarlet, but Mrs. Judson merely 
waved her fan a little quicker. 

“ There will be a great many private charities to meet. 
Each of the lady patronessesmas a list,” she said quietly. 

“Yes, I have heard so,” Mrs. Brown retorted; “women 
who have done them services either as toadies or favorites. 
That is understood among the knowing ones.” 

“ Madam ! ” 

Mrs. J udson seemed at least three inches taller than she 
had been a moment before, and her moire-antique rustled 
ominously in all its voluminous folds. 


Mrs. Judson Distributes the Funds. 89 

“I hear,” said Mrs. Brown, in no way daunted, “that 
there is not the president of a single moral reform or really 
benevolent society on the committee.” 

“I believe not,” answered Mrs. Judson with cold dignity; 
“but there is no reason why any or all of these societies 
should not unite and raise all the funds they can. We 
certainly do not prevent them.” 

“Certainly not! certainly not!” said Mrs. Green, who 
was determined on securing whatever was to be attained by 
flattery and persuasion. “ Only, you know, it would be useless 
to attempt it, after your brilliant success ; what could we do 
but creep after you at a very humble distance ? The truth 
is, we must depend on the country, — there our reports have a 
beautiful effect, — and upon the justice of your committee, all 
composed of ladies lifted beyond the idea of favoritism.” 

This soothing speech brought down Mrs. Judson’s ruffled 
pride, and she bent her head in acknowledgment of Mrs. 
Green’s good opinion. 

“ The ladies have striven to divide this money in a way 
that will secure the greatest good,” she said. 

“ What greater good can there be than the redemption of 
an immortal soul ! ” quoth Mrs. Brown, implacable in her 
belief that all the other^ societies represented in that room 
were bent on committing some fraud upon her. “ What 
shall it profit a man though he gain the whole world and 
lose his own soul?” 

“ Very true,” answered Mrs. Judson. “ Very true indeed. 
Now, shall we walk into the other room, ladies? — representa- 
tive ladies, I mean. The money has, I trust, been impartially 
apportioned between charitable societies and private claim- 
ants.” 

“Private claimants,” muttered Mrs. Brown. “I should 
like to know who they are.” 

“ Hush, dearest,” whispered Mr. Brown, who came for- 
ward to offer her his arm ; “ compose yourself ; your claims 
can never be overlooked while I am by.” 


9) 


Mrs. Judson Distributes ‘the Funds . 


“ You? ” retorted Mrs. Brown, with as much scorn as could 
be crowded into a low undertone. “ Who ever dreamed of 
depending on you — cheat others, but don’t try it on me.” 

“ My love, I — I greatly fear you are getting nervous.” 

Mrs. Brown snatched her hand indignantly from her hus- 
band’s arm, and marched by him in grim silence to the 
pretty boudoir, where Mrs. Judson was distributing the pro- 
ceeds of the charity ball with the benign calmness of a 
saint. 

As each lady received her roll of money, she betrayed 
something more than the usual curiosity of the sex, and was 
restless to be gone that she might learn the amount. So in 
a little time the party broke up, and with many thanks and 
sweet words, the ladies who had missions in the world glided 
up to the dressing-room w T here Jane Kelly and Ellen Burns 
sat waiting. 

For two or three minutes Mrs. Brown stood with her back 
to the busy sisterhood, and both hands were occupied as if 
arranging her dress, but Jane Kelly caught a sound of rus- 
tling paper, and went to the corner where she stood, with a 
shawl in her hand. 

“ Shall I help you, ma’am?” 

Mrs. Brown crushed the money in her hand, turned sud- 
denly, and saw Mrs. Green behind one of the window-cur- 
tains pursuing a like investigation. She stole forward, leav- 
ing Jane Kelly with the half-spread shawl in her hand. 
Before Mrs. Green became aware of it, the sister was peering 
over her shoulder. 

“ Just twenty-five dollars extra for your gross flattery,” 
she sneered, thrusting her own money out of sight ; “ I wish 
you joy of it.” 

“ Thank you,” said Mrs^ Green ; “ some time, perhaps, you 
will learn that sweet words pay.” 

Mrs. Brown strode solemnly to the other side of the room, 
took the shawl from Jane Kelly, and wrapped herself in it, 


The Saint and the Sinner . - 


91 


Then she drew a heavy knitted hood over her head and 
marched toward the door, where Mr. Brown stood meekly, 
holding a pair of rubber shoes in his hand. 

“ My love, it is snowing ; permit me — ” 

Down upon one knee the man went, and taking up the 
foot that seemed quivering to spurn him, incased it in the 
rubber — set it deferentially on the floor, planted the other on 
his knee, and completed his task with evident pride. 

There was a general demand for cloaks, shawls, and hoods 
after this, and the party broke up. 

“ My dear, how much ? ” questioned Mr. Brown with in- 
sinuating meekness, as he and his wife went down the steps 
together. 

“ Don’t ask me. It’s enough to aggravate a saint. Pri- 
vate charities, indeed, just sending the money back to the 
Evil One where it came from — then all these riff-raff socie- 
ties crowding in. The whole thing is just contemptible.” 

“ Exactly, my love,” replied Mr. Brown, “ exactly.” 


CPIAPTER XIV. 

THE SAINT AND THE SINNER. 

OW,” whispered the girl Ellen, breathless with terror 



iX lest Mrs. Judson should come into the room and find 
a stranger there ; “ get on your things, dear, we can steal 
down the servants’ staircase and no one the wiser. You 
must come again very soon, remember.” 

Jane Kelly consented to put on her bonnet and shawl, 
but she did it with a cool deliberation which drove her com- 
panion wild. 

“ Do make haste ! ” she entreated, frightened out of all 
patience, “ I hear her coming.” 


92 


The Saint and the Sinner. 


“Well, then, it is of no use; she is sure to be upon us. 
Never fear, I’ll take all the blame.” 

Jane stepped into the hall as she said this, and stood di- 
rectly in the light as Mrs. Judson came up the stairs with 
her head erect and her dress held up a little, that its length 
might not impede her progress. But for the bonnet and 
shawl, she might not have noticed Jane; as it was, she 
stopped suddenly and cast a sharp glance at Ellen. 

“ Who is this ? Who authorized you to bring company 
up here ? ” she said, in a cold, calm tone that made the girl 
shiver. 

“ No one authorized her, madam,” said Jane, with an air 
of profound humility. “ I come on business, special business 
with Mrs. Judson, the lady of the house.” 

“ With me ! ” 

“ If you are Mrs. Judson, and I suppose you are, it being 
difficult, not to say impossible, to find two such splendid — 
I beg pardon, ma’am, two such ladies in the world.” 

Mrs. Judson’s face became a shade less haughty, and she 
said with less anger in her voice, — 

“ Still there must be a mistake. I never saw you before.” 

“ True enough, lady ; but I think you will be glad to see 
me now. I’ve got something for you from that poor young 
creature that you’ve been trying to hear about.” 

Jane drew close to Mrs. Judson and said this in a voice 
so depressed, that Ellen could not gather its meaning. But 
Mrs. Judson understood her at once. The color left her 
face, she cast a sharp glance at Ellen and bade her go 
down-stairs and see that all the blinds were closed, then 
moving toward one of the chamber-doors, she opened it and 
made a gesture that Jane should follow. The girl obeyed 
and closed the door after her, while Mrs. Judson seated her- 
self stiffly, as if she had been in a church. 

“You can sit down,” she said, with unusual condescension. 

Jane did not heed the invitation, but drew close to Mrs. 


I llie Saint and the Sinner . 93 

J udson and took the velvet-bound volume from under her 
shawl. 

“ Does this belong to you, madam ? ” 

Mrs. Judson restrained an impulse to snatch the book, and 
reached forth her hand steadily. She examined the clasp, 
the title-page, and the words in her own writing before she 
looked up or spoke. At last she laid the book in her lap, 
and lifted her eyes to the girl. 

“ Where did you get this ? ” 

“ That is my affair, lady. How much is it worth to the 
young lady’s friends, is the question just now.” 

“ That is, you wish to sell it,” said Mrs. Judson. 

“ Yes, to some one. It must be of value, and I want two 
things.” 

“ What are the things you want?” 

“ Money, and a first-rate place — lady’s maid would suit 
me if I could find a lady to be proud of.” 

“ You seem to value this book highly.” 

“ Yes I do — very highly, and to my thinking the price 
will be growing higher and higher every minute.” 

“ Yet its first cost could not have been more than thirty 
dollars.” 

“ You know that better than I can. It was n’t the first 
cost or anything like it, I was thinking of.” 

“ What then, pray ? ” 

There was a tremor in the proud woman’s voice, spite of 
the effort she made to control it, and Jane Kelly saw with 
a throb of pleasure that she grew pale and sat less uprightly 
in her chair. 

“ It is n’t the book I’m selling, but what I know of the 
young lady who owned it. She was a relation of yours.” 

“ No she was not ! ” 

“ A connection then. You had charge of her.” 

“ Well ! ” 

“ You want to know all about her, and being proud as 


94 


The Saint and the Sinner. 


Lucifer — as an angel, I mean, won’t ask. I know it is n’t 
because you begrudge the money — all is, you won’t even 
yourself with me and talk tbe thing over sociably.” 

“ Sociably ! girl, you forget yourself.” 

“ No I don’t ; it’s you that won’t forget yourself. This 
minute you are dying to ask all I know, and that proud 
heart won’t allow you to say the word. Give back the 
book. The reporters who were so anxious to find out her 
history will be glad to get it.” 

“Reporters — reporters,” faltered Mrs. Judson, aghast 
with apprehension. “What does this mean? What has 
that wretched girl done? tell me everything you know. 
You are right, it is not money that I consider. Tell me.” 

“Well, how much are you ready to hand over for the 
book, — remember, only for the book, the rest I throw in.” 

“ Set your own price ; I cannot discuss that with you.” 

“Well, supposing we say two 4 hundred, and the place.” 

“ I will give the money.” 

“ And the place ? ” 

“Yes, yes, or its equivalent; go on.” 

“ Well, yes, I can trust you ; for you are a real lady, and no 
mistake.” 

Mrs. Judson opened her work-table drawer, which stood 
within reach, took a portemonnaie from it and gave Jane two 
crisp one-hundred dollar-bills without speaking a word. 

“ No mistake about that; you are a lady.” 

Mrs. Judson made an impatient gesture with her hand. 

“ Go on. Where is this young person ? ” 

“ In her grave.” 

Mrs. Judson uttered a sharp cry, and half started from 
her chair. 

“ No, no, I ’m going just a little too far. She is n’t buried 
yet. I managed to keep all that back twenty-four hours ; 
but she is in her pine coffin with about the scantest shroud 
on you ever saw ; and unless you stop it, she ’ll be taken off 
in the next boat-load.” 


The Saint and the Sinner. 


95 


“Woman! woman! what are you talking of?” cried Mrs. 
Judson, starting to her feet in a wild fit of excitement, all 
the composure of her pride gone, all her sublime calm swept 
away. “ Is that poor child really dead. Tell me at once 
what you know of her.” 

Mrs. Judson stood in the middle of the room, wringing her 
hands, and shivering as if a cold blast were sweeping over her. 

Jane looked upon her with a gleam of triumph in her 
eyes. At last she had made the haughty woman feel. 

“ This, madam, is what I know of her. About five weeks 
ago she came to the hospital.” 

“ What hospital ? ” 

“ Bellevue, the poor-house hospital. The people who come 
there are all paupers.” 

Mrs. Judson lifted both hands, as if to ward off a blow. 
“ Mercy ! have some mercy ! ” she cried ; “ you are spiteful ! 
you have been sent by some cruel enemy to torture me.” 

“ Not a bit of it, ma’am ; I am telling you nothing but 
tfie truth,” answered Jane, settling her shawl and pinning it 
afresh; “about five weeks ago she came to the hospital, a 
quiet, heart-sick, little thing, that seemed afraid to say her 
soul was her own. I don’t generally take much notice of 
the women, so many are coming and going, but she was so 
pretty and quiet, that I did now and then give her an extra 
turn of attention. She was half the time crying, and the 
other half writing or looking out of the windows, gloomy as 
the grave, speaking to no one, except it was another young 
thing like herself that no human creature seemed to know 
anything about, but so beautiful and humble. Well, it’s 
no use talking ; those two young creatures were ladies, and 
that I was sure of from the first. Well, when the time 
came, this one, she who owned the book, died.” 

Mrs. Judson had partially recovered from the shock which 
Jane had given her, and resumed her seat, pale and shiv 
ering, but resolute to listen more calmly. 


96 


The Saint and the Sinner . 


“ Did — did she suffer greatly ? ” 

“ Yes ; it would set you off again if I was to say how 
much ; both she and the baby died/’ 

“The baby?” 

“ Yes, of course ; I thought you understood that ! ” 

Mrs. Judson leaned back in her chair, gasping for breath. 
Jane thought that she was fainting, and was about to call for 
help, but a low voice recalled her. 

“No, no, I must bear this alone. Is there more for me 
to learn? Did she tell you nothing about herself? ” 

“ Nothing ; I did ask some questions, but she only cried 
and kept away from me.” 

“Did no person come to see her?” 

“ Not a soul.” 

“ Y ou spoke of writing ; what became of that ? ” 

“ Oh, it was letters ; she sent them away.” 

“ To whom were these letters directed ? ” 

“ That I don’t know; she always managed to get them off 
secretly.” 

“And this is all you 1* now of her?” 

“ Pretty much.’* .. W' : ’ 

“ But I have no certainty ; this book may have been stolen. 
I cannot be sure that the poor girl is the one I am interested 
in,” said Mrs. Judson, seized by a very natural doubt. 

“Yes, you can,” answered Jane, bluntly. “You asked 
about letters. That poor girl left one letter which will tell 
you something about her. There it is in her own hand- 
writing, if you know that, — look and see.” 

Mrs. Judson took the letter from Kelly’s hand; the ad- 
dress seemed to strike her with astonishment, and her hands 
shook as she unfolded it. The letter was a long one, but 
she read it twice, and seemed to ponder over it after every 
word had been gathered. Jane sat still reading the lady’s 
face, which for a time came out of its cold composure and 
was disturbed. 


The Saint and the Sinner . 


97 




“ Do you know the writing, madam ? ” 

Mrs. Judson looked up and answered the question, abrupt 
as it was. “Yes, it is her writing. You will leave the 
letter with me.” 

“No, madam, I cannot do that. It would be like robbing 
the dead. I mean to put that letter in the mail by daylight 
to-morrow morning. The man shall geff it, but I have taken 
a copy, and that you may have and no extra charge. You ’ve 
acted the lady by me, and I mean to act the lady by you ; 
give me that letter and take this, it ’s the same thing word 
for word.” 

Mrs. Judson folded the letter and exchanged it for that 
Jane Kelly held in her hand. 

“If this does not satisfy you, there is a way that will. 
Come and look upon her where she lies.” 

Mrs. Judson gazed on the woman who made this rude 
proposal in absolute terror for an instant, then pressing one 
hand over her eyes she seemed to reflect, and at last said, 
shuddering visibly, — 

“Tell me how to get there without observation, and I 
will come ” 

“ Could you get up by daybreak ? ” asked Jane. 

Mrs. Judson turned her head wearily against the back of 
her chair. 

“ I shall not go to bed. It would be of no use.” 

“So much the better,” answered Jane; “then just as it is 
getting light I will come here after you. It will be best to 
walk.” 

“ Yes, that will be best.” 

“ I will see that a gate is left unfastened and that every- 
thing is ready.” 

“ Must I go into that dreadful building ? ” 

“ What, into the hospital ? not at all. She is in the dead- 
house outside.” 

Mrs. Judson did not speak, but her face turned coldly 
6 


98 


Preparing for the Funeral. 

white. Jane looked at her with a sense of superiority. She 
was far above such weakness as that. Neither the living 
nor the dead could frighten her much. That half-hour had 
lifted her into a feeling almost of companionship with the 
woman who had swept by her so haughtily in the hall. 

“Don’t take on, ma’am,” she said ; “if I was you now, it 
would not be ten minutes before I should be in bed and 
sound asleep ; but there is a difference between people and 
people ; so if you like sitting up in a chair, why, chair it is, 
say I.” 

But Mrs. Judson was not sitting in her chair just then. 
Some new thought had seized upon her, and she was walk- 
ing up and -down the room in great agitation. When Jane 
Kelly was about to withdraw, she called her back. 

“ If this should prove true,” she said, “ I shall want help, 
and have no one to confide in. Will you be faithful and 
silent if I double the sum you have just received ? ” 

“ True as steel, and silent as the grave. Try me.” 

“ If it should prove true, I will. You may go now.” 

As Jane went down stairs, Ellen was waiting in the hall, 
and would have stopped her for a little free gossip, but Jane 
passed her, only stopping to say, — 

“Wait till I come again, then you shall hear lots.” 


CHAPTER XY. 

PREPARING FOR THE FUNERAL. 

E ARLY the next morning, Mrs. Judson went out from tho 
basement of her house, almost for the first time in her 
life, and in company with Jane Kelly passed into the street. 
None of the servants were up, and the lady had put on a 


99 


Preparing for the Funeral. 

walking-dress, so plain and dark, that no one would have 
been likely to notice her had many persons been abroad. 
Through that side-gate in the garden-wall, Jane conducted 
her charge, and they passed together down that same gloomy 
path into a little stone building near the water. 

“Don’t be afraid; it’s nothing when you get used to it,” 
she said, patronizingly. “ I remember almost fainting the 
first time I came here, but now I don’t even think of it.” 

All this show of courage did not prevent Mrs. Judson 
from turning cold as marble when that door was thrown 
open, and she found herself close by a coarse pine coffin, 
from which Jane was composedly removing the lid. 

The lady cast one glance at the dead- whiteness of the face 
revealed to her, and retreated into the open air, pale, almost, 
as the corpse she had left. 

Jane followed her, swinging the key on her finger. 

“ Is it her, lady ? ” she asked, in a whisper. 

“Yes.” 

“ Well, what am I to do ? ” 

“ Can it be quietly removed ? Is that permitted ? ” 

“Yes ; money can do anything. Tell me what you want, 
and I ’ll do it ; for if any one knows how, it ’s the person be- 
fore you.” 

Mrs. Judson stood in the garden a while irresolute, then 
she turned toward the woman and said, almost helplessly, 
notwithstanding her great pride, — 

“ You know best how to manage it. I will tell you what 
I want, then try and carry out my wishes.” 

“Of course, I mean to do that — only tell me what they 
are.” 

“ She must be buried from my house.” 

“ Well, that can be done.” 

“ But she must be brought there unseen, if possible.” 

“Nothing easier. You want everything of the best, no 
doubt?” 


100 


Preparing for the Funeral . 


“Yes” 

“ Well, have your crape handy ; I’ll take care of the rest. 
When all is ready, I ’ll call up. Say nothing about it till 
then, please; just leave the servants to me. Say as little 
as you can, and don’t let them know anything till I come, 
which will be about dark.” 

“Thank you,” said Mrs. Judson, forgetting her pride in 
a strong sense of relief. “ I shall depend on you.” 

“ Dear me, how a little trouble takes the starch out of 
a woman like that ! Last night she wanted to sweep by me 
like a peacock; now, now it’s all whiteness and swan’s down; 
never mind, I rather like her, any way.” Saying this, Jane 
locked the side-gate and walked leisurely back to the hos- 
pital. 

A little after dusk that evening Jane Kelly called deco- 
rously, and inquired for Mrs. Judson of a supercilious foot- 
man, who would have questioned her right to see that lady, 
but for the timely interposition of the girl, Ellen. As it 
was, Ellen admitted her at once to Mrs. Judson’s bed-room, 
where she remained a full hour. When she came down 
stairs, Ellen, was ready to intercept her, and they went 
together into the servants’ parlor, where Jane dropped at 
once into a most confidential conversation. 

“You see, Ellen, it was about that very young lady that 
I came. A friend of mine lives at the boarding-school where 
Mrs. Judson put her before she went to the springs.” 

“ The boarding-school ! dear me, was that so ? Why, not 
a servant in the house knew a word about it ; then it was not 
a detective she called in?” 

“ Not a bit of it; that was the madam’s real-estate agent.” 

“You don’t say so ! But why was it kept close where the 
young lady went to school ? ” 

.“Close! why it wasn’t kept close at all. Of course, she 
could not come home when the house was as good as closed.” 

“ That ’s true ; but where is she now ?” 


Preparing for the Funeral . 


101 


“ Ellen, I am going to tell you something mournful. It 
was that I came to tell Mrs. Judson last night, but you must 
not let the other servants know. Miss Louisa is dead.” 

“Dead! and you talked as if you had never seen her, 
last night. Dear me, dead ! ” 

“Yes, sudden — cholera — taken down and died before help 
could come. The poor lady up-stairs is dreadfully cut up.” 

“ Dear me, how dreadful ! ” 

“ But above all things, don’t hint to the servants that she 
died of cholera ; the funeral will have to be from the house, 
you know, and the neighbors might get frightened.” 

“ Oh ! I would n’t for the world,” protested Ellen, — “ not 
for the world.” 

“ Now, not a word of this to any one in the house,” Jane 
went on impressively, “ your lady would not like to have the 
boarding-school spoken of.” 

“ But what school was it? ” 

“ Oh, Catholic ; those Catholics keep their scholars so close ; 
besides, this idea of cholera might hurt the school. Least 
said, soonest mended. I don’t suppose they let the scholars 
know what she died of.” 

“ I am glad she died in the true faith, any way,” said 
Ellen, just then remembering that she was a Catholic herself, 
and making a quick motion of the cross. “ You and I don’t 
want to bring trouble on a Catholic school.” 

“ But you will mention to no human soul that she was 
sent to a Catholic school ; her brother is a little that way, I 
am told, and as for the cholera, not a word.” 

“ Not a word.” 

“ Or my friend would get into trouble. She trusted me 
just as you have. Was n’t it strange that both of you should 
begin talking about the very same thing, just by accident? 
But I never mentioned your name to the lady up-stairs, only 
to say how long I had known you, and what splendid places 
you had always been in. She thinks my other friend told 
me all I know.” 


102 Preparing for the Funeral . 

“ That was very good of you.” 

“ Oh, I ’m to be trusted. Indeed I would n’t mention the 
word hospital before her for the world ; I really believe it 
would make’lier faint.” 

“ I ’m sure it would,” said Ellen. 

“ Now I must be going. But about that place, Ellen ; stand 
by me and I’ll stand by you.” 

There was a dash of patronage about all this, which 
impressed Ellen considerably. She went to the basement- 
door with Jane, as a mark of particular respect, and put a 
finger to her lip, nodding emphatically in answer to a like 
signal from the nurse, as she passed into the street. 

Scarcely had Jane disappeared, when Ellen ran into the 
kitchen full of potential excitement, which was sure to throw 
every servant in the house into a state of wondering inquiry. 
Of course, she was at once surrounded and eagerly questioned. 
But no, what she had heard was intrusted to her in strict 
confidence, nothing on earth would prevail on her to speak. 
For her part, she had always thought something dread- 
ful would come of that dear young lady being taken off so 
strangely, without a word to the servants, who had, one and 
all, been as kind to her as kind could be. Of course, they 
were all good Catholics, but then, to have religion forced on 
one was hard. The cholera, of all dreadful diseases, think 
of it ! Well, there was some comfort in knowing the sisters 
were good nurses. Only she hoped that awful cholera would 
not spread through the school. 

What school ? Why, of course, she would not tell for the 
whole world. Only some one they all knew and loved dearly 
would be brought home from a Catholic school in her 
coffin. She, for one, hoped that cholera would neither be 
left behind or come with her. 

Before Ellen had concluded her little harangue, every 
servant in the house stood listening, open-mouthed and eager 
as hounds on the scent. Of course, they understood all 


103 


Preparing for the Funeral . 

about it quite as well as she did, but thirsting for more, 
asked innumerable questions, to which Ellen shook her head 
solemnly, and declared that nothing could induce her to give 
one hint of what had been said in the strictest confidence ; 
it would be awfully mean if she did, and her friend who 
had lived so close to the New Haven College that she could 
almost speak Latin, would never forgive her, never ! 

With an impressive emphasis on the last word, Ellen gave 
her head a consequential fling, and went up stairs in answer 
to Mrs. Judson’s bell, which had rung more than once. 

She found Mrs. Judson sitting quietly in her easy-chair, 
looking pale and harassed, but in both speech and manner 
self-possessed as usual. 

“ Ellen/’ she said, reaching forth some streamers of black 
crape and white ribbon, “ you will see that these are properly 
arranged for the door. You will be sorry to hear that there 
will be a funeral here.” 

“ Dead ! oh, dear ! how dreadful ! ” sobbed Ellen, lifting a 
corner of her muslin apron half-way to her eyes and drop- 
ping it again. “Please, madam, where did she die, and 
what of! ” 

Mrs. Judson was not prepared to answer these very natu- 
ral questions, so she swept them away with a mournful wave 
of her hand. 

Ellen took the crape and busied herself in arranging the 
ribbon. Mrs. Judson watched her quietly. She was very 
sad, and the shock of the morning affected her nerves so 
much that she started when Ellen spoke again. 

“Excuse me, ma’am, but is cholera catching after the 
person is dead?” 

“ The cholera ! ” faltered the lady. “No, I should think 
not ; but why do you ask? ” 

Ellen remembered Jane Kelly’s charge of secrecy, and 
struggled hard to obey it. 

“Oh, nothing — I only happened to be thinking that — 


104 


Preparing for the Funeral * 

that, perhaps — dear me ! I never thought anything of the 
kind, only the neighbors, ma’am, might, from its sudden- 
ness, think it was something like cholera that took her off. 
If they do, what shall we servants say ? ” 

“ Say that you do not know ; that will be right,” answered 
Mrs. Judson, struck with an idea that there might be safety in 
this supposition, yet unwilling to suggest a falsehood in words. 

“ Just as if we didn’t know all about it,” muttered Ellen, 
as she went down stairs with the crape streamers in her hand. 
“ Law ! she might as well attempt to keep the wind from blow- 
ing as the whole neighborhood not finding out. The moment 
this is seen at the door, won’t we have calls from every base- 
ment in the block? Well, I haven’t told a word, anyhow.” 

About half-past eleven that evening strange sounds were 
heard in that stately mansion. The tramp of heavy feet, 
and the smothered whispers of men carrying some burden 
up the broad staircase. This lasted a brief time ; then the 
stealthy closing of a door, the rattle of wheels moving 
slowly down the street, and everything was still again. But 
all night long the gleam of a funeral light broke faintly 
through the imperfectly closed blinds of an upper chamber, 
where Jane Kelly sat, half asleep, watching by a coffin cov- 
ered with black velvet, on which embossments and handles 
of silver gave out a faint glow, mournfully in keeping with 
the stillness and the shadows. 

A lady, sitting alone in her chamber, heard these sounds 
with a shudder of mortal dread, and watched also, in bitter 
solitude-; for sleep that night was impossible to her. The 
servants, high up under the French roof, whispered very 
seriously in their separate rooms; -wondered, commented, 
and thought of going away in a body from the house, which 
might be dangerously infected. Early in the morning this ex- 
citement spread from basement to chamber, through the entire 
block ; for long streamers of crape at Mrs. Judson’s door 
awoke general apprehension, and that day three families left 


105 


Preparing for the Funeral . 

the block, driven into the country by fear of the cholera, 
which had emanated in the mysterious hints of that prudent 
girl, Ellen. 

That afternoon, a hearse with white plumes and a costly 
coffin, visible through the half-veiled crystal of its windows, 
drove slowly from the house, followed by a dozen car- 
riages with the curtains down, most of them empty. Even 
Mrs. Judson’s popularity — joined to the pleasant remem- 
brance of a fair young creature who had. for a time been 
considered the sunlight of her home — could not induce the 
neighbors to brave their fears of infection in order to pay 
homage to the dead. 

So the funeral cortege moved slowly away toward Green- 
wood, and the mystery of that young creature’s death was 
lost in the general apprehension of a disease which, about 
that time, was a word of terror in the land. 

After this, a black-edged letter, written by a hand that 
shivered as it penned the words which were to give so much 
sorrow, went from that house to Europe ; a few more were 
carried east and west. Then Mrs. Judson retired to her 
place in the country for a fortnight, while the gloom was 
swept away from the house. 


CHAPTER XYI. 

PARTING WITH THE CHILD. 

M ARY MARGARET DILLON was about to leave the 
Institution. She had dressed her boy with great care, 
changed the hospital clothes for her own garments, and came 
to make a last call at Catharine Lacy’s bed. 

“Faix, but it ’s goodness all over to see you lying there with 
the poor orphan in your arms, motherly as can be, though 
ye do look like a child yerself,” she said, seating herself at 


106 


Parting with the Child. 

the foot of her young neighbor’s becl ; “ and it’s thriving so, 
would n’t it be a blessed sight to the mother, who is gone. 
Poor young mother, if she could only look upon us now and 
see the child cuddling down in the bed like a birdie in its 
nest ? ” 

The young woman smiled ; she was very weak and pallid 
yet, but the dimples would come around her mouth when- 
ever she looked down upon the baby. 

“Ye’re mighty fond of it, I can see that with half an 
eye,” said Margaret, tossing up her own plump boy with 
both hands ; but here ’s a shaver that will weigh down two 
of him, if he is n’t so white and purty. Did ye ever see a 
crathur thrive like this little felly. Kiss him now, plump 
on the mouth, he ’s nate as a pink all over ; and I ’m going 
home for good the morning.” 

“ Going home ! ” exclaimed her friend, starting up and 
holding out her arms for the child. “ Oh ! w T hat shall I do 
after that ; it will be terrible staying here all alone ! ” 

“ True, for ye ; but I ’ll be coming and going, never fear. 
The old man is lonesome like, and the childer trouble him, 
so he wants me to the fore.” 

“ Oh, if I were only well enough to go out,” sighed the 
young creature, whose delicate arms had already drooped 
under the weight of Mrs. Dillon’s baby ; “ but where could 
I go — where could I go ? ” 

“ Now, whist a bit,” answered Mary Margaret, in full 
sympathy. “When the time comes, look to the blessed 
Saviour ; but first, ye know, find out the shanty of Margaret 
Dillon ; it ’s on the rocks above Fortieth Street. Y e ’ll know 
it by a black goat that browses there ; to say nothing of two 
geese and a duck that paddles in the bit of a pond close by ; 
whenever it is, ye ’ll be welcome as the spring-flowers.” 

By this time the young woman was crying, and Margaret 
felt sympathetic tears stealing into her eyes. 

“ Ye ’ll be sure to come ? ” 


107 


Parting with the Child. 

“ Yes; you have been so good to me, Mrs. Dillon, and I 
don’t know that I have another friend in the world.” 

“ Well, now, give the boy another kiss, — for luck, you 
know, — and i ’ll be going.” 

The young woman rose feebly from her pillow and kissed 
the child ; then she held up her trembling mouth for Mar- 
garet’s hearty farewell, and turning her face to the pillow, 
began to cry. 

Margaret, who had been bundling the child away under 
her shawl, gave him another breath of air, and seating 
herself on the bed again, began to comfort that poor young 
creature, who was, in truth, about parting with her last 
friend. While she was bending over her in a fit of motherly 
compassion, a woman came into the ward accompanied by 
Jane Kelly and one of the young doctors, who had charge 
that day and was scarcely more than a student. 

“ Here is the child we were speaking of,” said Jane, com- 
ing up to the bed and turning back the blankets; “all the 
rest have some one to take care of them.” 

She attempted to take the sleeping babe from the bed ; 
but the young creature started up like a lioness, her face 
flushing hotly and her eyes dilating. 

“ What are you after — not my child ! go away ! go away ! ” 

“Come, come, no nonsense. This woman has got her 
order,” said Jane Kelly ; “ give up the child and let’s hear 
no more of this. She is a first-class nurse and will be a 
mother to it.” 

“ Mother and father both,” sniffed the woman ; but the 
young patient grew more and more frightened. Seeing no 
reason for hope in the woman, she turned to the doctor. 

“ Oh, doctor, don’t, don’t ! it will kill me to part with 
him.” 

Those great blue eyes deepened into the purple of a violet 
with sharp apprehension, and she clung to tlje child on her 
bosom in passionate resistance. 


108 


Parting with the Child . 


“ It does not hurt me,” she pleaded ; “ why, any one can 
tell you how strong I am. Only yesterday I sat up in the 
bed half an hour. He ’s doing so nicely. Ask Mrs. Dillon, 
who loves him almost as much as I do ; poor little creature, 
I am sure his mother would ask it, if she only knew.” 

“But the woman hasher order from headquarters. She’s 
an experienced nurse, and the child will be better off with 
her,” said the young man, who had been impressed with the 
opinion that the young woman must be suffering from her 
care of the babe ; for Jane Kelly was considered as 
authority in these things by the students, and usually man- 
aged to have her own way. 

“You see how the least thing excites her,” she whispered. 

The young man nodded his head, and began to reason with 
his patient. 

“ You are not strong enough.” 

“ Yes I am, very, very strong.” 

“But you will go away soon, and then he must be given up.” 

The poor thing fell back upon her pillow, broken-hearted. 
This was the truth; what could she do with the child, even if 
it was permitted her to have it — she, who had no shelter 
for her own head. 

“ Ah, sir, let me keep it a little while longer ; see what a 
comfort he is to me. I can almost make him smile.” 

She touched the infant’s cheek with the tip of her finger, 
and made a piteous noise with her quivering mouth, at 
which the child began to cry, — and so, in fact, did Mary 
Margaret. 

“He does almost laugh, sometimes,” pleaded the patient, 
sadly disappointed, and looking up with pathetic earnestness. 

“It’s because you are all looking at him. Please go 
away, I am quite sure that worn — that lady, will make him 
cry harder. He seems to know what she wants, poor little 
fellow.” 

“ But the authorities have decided he must be put out to 
nurse.” 


109 


Parting with the Child. 

“ But not yet, oh ! not yet ; besides — ” 

She lifted up her hand, with a gesture that induced the 
doctor to stoop. 

“ Besides, she does not look kind,” she whispered, trem- 
bling with fear lest the woman might understand her. “In- 
deed ; indeed, she does not ! ” 

“ Look here,” interposed Jane Kelly. “ This sort of hum- 
bug can’t go on any longer. Doctor, you may take it on 
yourself to disobey an order from headquarters, but I 
won’t. This woman is authorized to take this very child, 
it being an orphan, — and this child she is going to have, if 
all the women in the ward go into hysterics.” 

Here Mrs. Dillon interfered. 

“ Let the poor thing be, doctor ; one day can do no harm. 
If the child is to be put out, give me a chance; no own 
mother ever took such care of it as I will.” 

Here the young woman started up in bed. 

“Yes! yes! let her have it — I won’t say one word, so 
long as I know it is with her.” 

The doctor looked at Jane. 

“Why not?” 

“ Why not? because this woman has her order, and is going 
to take that identical child along with her, and no shirking.” 

The young man gave way. He really had no authority 
to interfere. So with absolute violence Jane forced the babe 
from those clinging arms, and tore it away, leaving that 
poor creature in an agony of grief. Again Mary Margaret sat 
down by the bed, and made an effort to console the grief she 
had failed to avert, but she was only answered by heart- 
broken sobs, and her protege fell into a trembling fit that 
shook the bed. After a while she seemed more quiet. Then 
Mary Margaret took up her child sorrowfully, and went 
away crying, as if she herself had been bereaved. That 
night the poor creature was taken dangerously ill, and for 
weeks and weeks scarcely knew a soul that spoke to her. 


110 


Where Could She Go. 


CHAPTER XVII. 


WHERE COULD SHE GO? 


A YOUNG girl, pale and fragile almost as a shadow, 
came through the side-gate of Bellevue. She hesitated 
a moment, looked up and down the street, and then turning 
toward the water, moved languidly to an angle of the wharf, 
and placing a little bundle at her feet, glanced drearily 
down upon the tide as it rushed in and out against the 
timbers. 

It was near sunset, and the March winds, that blew raw 
and cold from the river, seemed to chill her through and 
through, for her sweet, pale features became pinched, while j 
she sat there lost in gloomy thought, and a tinge of purple 
crept around her mouth, which trembled visibly either from ^ 
chilliness or coming tears. Her eyes seemed fascinated by 
the water, so dark and turbid that it appeared to hold some -j 
mysterious secret of repose in its depths ; and once or twice j 
she murmured, “ Why not ? why not ? ” in a voice of the J 
most touching misery. Then she relapsed into silence again, .] 
broken only by a shiver when the wind rushed sharply over 
her. 


“ Where can I go ? ” she exclaimed at last, her voice 
breaking forth in a cry of anguish. “ To his mother — she 
will turn me away with insults, as she did before. To my 
aunt?” 

She uttered the name with a shudder* and shrunk down 
beneath her shawl, as if some blow had been threatened, 
and relapsed into dreary silence again. 

At last she arose with an effort, and casting a regretful . 
look back upon the water, as if she longed to sleep beneath 
it, moved up the street again, her frail figure wavering to and 
fro, like the stalk of a flower, beneath the light weight of her 


Where Could She Go. 


Ill 


bundle. . Thus she disappeared in one of the cross streets 
that intersect the Second Avenue. 

We find her again, just at nightfall, panting with fatigue, 
before a palace-building in the vicinity of Murry Hill. There 
she stood, grasping the iron fence with her hands, afraid to 
advance, and physically unable to retreat. It was a pitiful 
sight, that fair young creature, trembling beneath the weight 
of her little bundle, and kept only from falling to the earth 
by the hold she had clenched on the cold iron. 

The brown front of the building loomed above her with 
forbidding grandeur. The sculptured lions, crouching on 
the stone pedestals each side the broad entrance-steps, seemed 
frowning her away. But there she stood, breathless and 
wavering, afraid to let go her hold lest she should fall to 
the earth. 

The gas had just been kindled within the house, and a 
flood of light came pouring through the stained sashes of a 
bay window, and fell like a gorgeous rain on the pavement, 
illuminating, as it were, her misery. 

The young woman fell back, and slowly retreated from 
the light, clutching at the iron fence at every step. 

“Oh that I could get away! — oh that I had not come! 
I am sinking — they will find me senseless on the pavement. 
Oh, my God, give me strength — one moment’s strength.” 

There was strong mental energy in that frail creature, 
and the desperate cry with which she appealed to God 
seemed to win down life from heaven. She unclenched her 
hand from the railing, paused an instant, casting her eyes 
first to the basement entrance and then to the sunken arch 
guarded by the lions, and walked on with something of firm- 
ness, nay, even of pride in the movement. 

“No, not there,” she said, passing the basement, and 
mounting the flight of steps hurriedly, as one who felt her 
strength giving way, “ I am her sister’s child, and will 
enter here.” 


112 


Where Could She Go. 


She rang the bell and waited, struggling firmly against 
her weakness, and sustained by that moral courage which 
is the only true bravery of womanhood. 

“ I have done no wrong,” she thought, “ why should this 
terror come over me ? If poverty and helplessness were a 
sin, then I might tremble, but not now — not for this — not 
because I have left a pauper’s bed for her stone palace.” 

The door opened, and a dainty mulatto boy, with livery 
buttons, and a white handkerchief visible at a side-pocket, 
presented himself. 

“Mrs. Judson? could n’t say; better go down to the base- 
ment. That’s the sort of thing for serving-people, and 
folks that come with bundles ; couldn’t take it upon me to 
answer a single question here,” he said. 

The girl advanced quietly into the hall, and sat down, 
with the light of a tinted lantern overhead falling directly 
upon her. 

In spite of her little straw bonnet and plaided blanket- 
shawl, the boy discovered something in her air, and the pure 
loveliness of her features, that checked his rising imperti- 
nence. 

“ Go tell your mistress that Miss no, that her 

niece wishes to speak with her.” 

The boy paused to take a survey of her person, and went 
down the hall, smiling till his white teeth shone again. 

“ Perhaps it’s a lie, and’perhaps it is n’t — who knows,” he 
muttered, threading his way up the flight of stairs set aside 
for menials. “ But won’t she catch it for claiming relation- 
ship, true or not? — well, I should n’t wonder.” 

The greatest trial that can be inflicted on an ardent na- 
ture is that of waiting . When the mulatto came back, he 
found the young person who had excited his curiosity, with 
a flush in her cheeks, eagerly watching his approach. 

“You may go up to Mrs. Judson’s room,” he said, and 
muttering to himself, he added, “ and much good it ’ll do 
you.” 

\ 


113 


Where Could She Go. 

♦* 

The girl was about to mount the richly carpeted steps 
that swept down between those curving rosewood balusters 
like a sloping bed of moss mottled with forest-flowers, but 
the mulatto interfered. 

“ This way, miss, this way ; Mrs. Judson ordered me to be 
particular and bring you up these stairs.” 

The girl withdrew her foot from the soft carpet and fol- 
lowed the boy in silence. The atmosphere of the house af- 
fected her feeble form pleasantly, and she longed to lie down 
and sleep before seeing her aunt. The carpets under her feet 
were so luxuriously pliant, it seemed impossible for her to 
move. The air was bland and fragrant ; as she pressed for- 
ward, the breath of flowers from an open balcony swept over 
her, and it seemed, after the atmosphere of Bellevue, like a 
gale from paradise. 

Oh ! if she could but remain quietly where she was all 
night, without seeing any one, with that soft carpet to sleep 
on, the breath of those flowers floating over her. But no, 
the mulatto kept turning to be sure that she was close be- 
hind ; for he seemed rather suspicious of her frequent pauses. 
At last he threw open a chamber-door. 

“This is Mrs. Judson’s room, miss.” The boy made a 
feint as if going back in great haste, but returned in a 
moment, entered the chamber, gliding along the wall, and 
peeped through the partially closed door, with all the craft 
of his race, determined to ascertain by the first words 
whether the fair girl with her humble garments was really 
the niece of his mistress or not. 

The room which this strange girl entered was a bed-cham- 
ber, fitted up in a style of stately grandeur which contrasted 
strongly with the mournful look and modest garb of the 
young girl, who should have clainml a free welcome there. 

A spacious bed stood on one side^iigh up over the pillows 
was a light gilded canopy of grape-leaves and fruit, through 
which the crimson drapery, that swept to the ground ou 
7 


114 


Where Could She Go. 


each side, gleamed like flashes of the sunset through a golden 
cloud. The same rich crimson broke through the open net- 
work of rosewood that formed the foot-board and side-pieces 
of the bedstead ; and to this was contrasted the pure white- 
ness of richly laced pillows, and a counterpane that seemed 
of quilted snow. On a crimson lounge, severely magnificent, 
for all this grandeur had an air of rigid coldness hanging 
over it, Mrs. Judson was seated, with a slight frown upon 
her forehead, and her keen, black eyes fixed upon the door. 

The girl saw this, as she paused a moment in the shadow 
before entering ; and she saw also, with a sinking heart, that 
the frown deepened as she made her appearance ; while a 
quick pressure of the lip added to the displeasure of that 
haughty face. 

Mrs. Judson had evidently been disturbed while complet- 
ing her evening toilet, for though her purple brocade fell in 
precise and voluminous richness adown her tall figure, her 
headdress of purple velvet and golden acorns hung upon a 
branch of gilded spray attached to the frame of her toilet- 
glass, while several diamond ornaments glittered upon the 
marble underneath, and an undersleeve of Brussels point 
had evidently fallen from her hand upon the carpet before 
she assumed her present imposing attitude. 

“ Well,” said the lady, with frigid dignity, “you have 
come again, I see ; what is the trouble now ? ” 

“ I have no home — I am in want,” said the poor girl, in 
a quiet, sad voice. “You are my mother’s sister — sister to 
an angel in heaven — and in her name I ask you to have 
pity on me ! ” 

“No home? no home? Were you not bound to Madame 
De Marke ? I How could I, or any one, provide for you 
better ? You astonish ^ by these complaints ! ” 

“ Madame De Marke^gave up her house almost a year 
ago,” answered the girl, with a degree of gentle firmness 
that imparted dignity even to her tone of supplication ; “ she 
is very rich ; but no beggar in the street lives more meanly.” 


Where Could She Go. 


115 


“Well, but you were bound to her still; she is compelled 
by law to give you a home.” 

The girl smiled a wan smile, but with an expression of 
some humor in it. 

“ Madame De Marke’s home ! Do you know what it is, 
aunt ? A room in the loft of one of her own buildings. 
The lowest servant in your house would turn from it in dis- 
dain ; and for food, why, aunt, this rich woman lives abso- 
lutely the life of a beggar, and in the market asks, for her 
cat, refuse scraps of meat, which she devours herself. That 
was the home and food which Madame De Marke gave to 
me, after she left her house. Instead of being lady’s maid, 
I was compelled to sweep out the offices and scrub the stores 
for her tenants.” 

“ Indeed I ” exclaimed the lady, smoothing the trimming 
of her sleeve. “ Madame De Marke forgot that I bound you 
to her, it seems to me.” 

“No, madam, she did not forget it; and because you 
had abandoned me because of her knowledge that I was 
friendless, she made me a drudge. I was not strong ; the 
work broke me down. Oh ! aunt, I was heart-sick, and 
ready to fall down on my knees with gratitude for the least 
breath of kindness, and — and ” 

“ Well,” said the aunt, looking coldly up, as the poor girl 
paused, her eyes full of tears, her lips quivering. 

“ There was one noble person who was kind to me, so kind 
that I could not help loving him, aunt.” Catharine said this 
in a low voice, and trembling from head to foot. 

“Him!” cried the aunt, half-starting from her lounge, 
“ him, a man ! Shameless girl! how dare you talk of a love 
like that in my presence ? ” 

“Aunt, I have not another creature to love on earth.” 

“And who told you — who compelled you to love at all? 
It is an indecorous word.” 

“And yet ‘God is love!’” answered Catharine, lifting 


116 


Where Could She Go. 


her soft eyes, misty with tearfulness, while her lips uncon- 
sciously pronounced the quotation. 

“Don’t quote Scripture here in this infamous fashion; 
don’t talk to me of love. What right had you to love any 
one but Madame De Marke herself? Thank heaven ! I never 
found it necessary to love any one.” 

“ But I,” answered the girl, with the most profound hu- 
mility, “ Jhad no other happiness. I never knew what it was 
to love myself, till he told me how dear, how beautiful I was 
to him.” 

The aunt arose and stood up. Her dress fell in rustling 
folds to the floor, her black eyes flashed fiercely. 

“How dare you — infamous girl, how dare you? Leave 
the house ! ” 

“No, aunt, I am not infamous. He loved me, and I, oh ! 
how truly I loVed him. We were married, aunt; as hon- 
orably married as you and my uncle were. Do not call me 
infamous ; I will not endure it.” 

The aunt sat down again, wondering at the strange beauty 
that lighted up that young face, almost touched by the 
passionate speech, for she could understand all the pride 
that was in it, though pathos and appeal were lost upon her. 

“ Speak a little more moderately, if you have anything 
to say; and if you are truly married, tell me how, and 
when. I ’m sure it would give me great pleasure to have 
you well settled and off my hands. Who is the man you 
are talking about?” 

“Young De Marke,” answered the girl, drawing close to 
her aunt, and speaking in a whisper ; “ but do not let any 
one know ; he said I might tell you, but no person else.” 

“ Catharine Lacy, this is a shameful falsehood, or young 
De Marke is base beyond anything I ever heard of. Wretch- 
ed girl, I have quite as good proof as you can bring that you 
are not his only victim. But where is this man now ? ” 

“ He is away. I have not seen him since last fall. He 


T Were Could She Go. 


117 


does not know how miserable I am. Aunt, dear aunt, have 
pity on me; I have just come from the hospital — my poor 
baby is dead and buried.” 

“ Hospital ! what hospital ? Not Bellevue ? not the Alms- 
house ? ” ^ 

“Yes, the Almshouse, aunt. Where else could I go ? 
He was away, and if he wrote, I never got the letter. His 
mother turned me out-of-doors, with bitter language 'and 
coarse abuse. I was afraid to come here.” 

“ But if you were married, how dare Madame De Marke 
treat you in this way ? ” 

“She pretended not to believe me — though I am sure he 
told her of our marriage with his own lips. She was angry 
because I would not let her keep my certificate, and said it 
was all made up.” 

“Where did this marriage take place?” inquired the 
aunt, quickly. 

“In Philadelphia. He went there when Madame was 
away from home a week. She did not know of it.” 

“ Let me read the certificate,” said the aunt, extending 
her hand ; “ if that is genuine, I will see that the rights of 
my relative are respected, let what will have gone before. 
This young man must inherit a fine property, De Marke was 
very rich. The certificate of marriage, girl. What are 
you waiting for ? ” 

The poor girl began to weep bitterly, and, wringing her 
hands, fell upon her knees before that haughty woman. 

“Oh! aunt, aunt, don’t ask me; I have lost it — I have 
lost it ! ” 


118 


Turned Out-of-Doors. 


CHAPTER XVIII. 

• ■ 

TURNED OUT-OF-DOORS. 

M RS. JTJDSON drew back from her niece, gathering the 
folds of her dress around her, as if she feared those 
quivering little hands might impart shame to her person. 

“Oh!” she said, with bitter emphasis, “lost, is it? 
When? where?” 

“ I don’t know. It was in my bosom when I was taken 
ill ; but after that I remember nothing about it.” 

“ Indeed !” exclaimed the aunt, and the unpleasant gleam 
broke fiercely into her eyes ; “ and as you lost the Certificate,” 
she added, “ what was the clergyman’s name who married 
you?” 

“I don’t remember. He told me that the paper was 
right, and I never troubled myself to read it. But he knows, 
of course.” 

“Oh, of course, he knows,” echoed the proud woman, 
disdainfully. “ But the place ? In what place was this won- 
derful marriage performed, did you say?” 

“In Philadelphia.” ^ 

“ Well, the street — in what street did this clergyman, with 
the forgotten name, live ? ” 

“ I never knew,” answered the weeping girl ; “ but, oh ! 
aunt, do not doubt me ; for, as Heaven is my witness, we 
were married.” 

“ Oh, yes ! the proofs are conclusive,” answered the lady, 
with bitter irony. 

“ Aunt, aunt, do believe me ! ” cried the girl, moving for- 
ward on her knees, and holding up her clasped hands. “He 
wfill tell you how true it is ; he will get another certificate. 
He cannot be away much longer ; let me live with you till 
he comes.” 


119 


Turned Out-of-Doors. 

“ When he comes to own you, in my presence, you shall 
have shelter here. Till then, never enter my door again. 
Go now, and live, if you can, on this falsehood and its 
shamelessness.” 

“ Oh ! aunt, aunt ! ” cried the wretched girl, “ I am his 
wife — I am his wife! Look at me; do I blush? Do my 
eyes sink ? Aunt, I am innocent of wrong as you are, and 
as truly a wedded wife as you ever were ! ” 

It was painful to see the cold, stern pride which rose and 
swelled in that woman’s bosom, lifting her form haughtily 
upward, and quenching the color from her lips on which 
the last cruel words of that interview were forming. 

“ Leave the room ; leave my house forever ! ” she cried, 
pointing to the door. “ Go, hide your infamy, and tell those 
romances among your proper associates.” 

“ I shall neither disgrace nor use any name with which you 
have been connected,” she said in a voice so steady and low 
that it fell upon the ear with singular impressiveness. “ In 
my misfortunes you will find no record which can wound 
your pride or bring disgrace on the name of my mother. I 
have no permission to use the name of my husband ; but he 
will return, and standing by my side call on you to retract 
the insults you have heaped upon me. Until then I will 
perish in the streets, rather than look you in the face or 
darken your door. 

“Oh, aunt!” she continued with a burst of feeling, “you 
have been very cruel to me, terribly cruel in your doubts, 
for I am honorably married and as honestly loved as you 
ever were.” 

Mrs. Judson drew herself back with haughty uprightness, 
and pointed her finger at the girl. 

“You compare yourself with me!” she exclaimed, — 
“ with me f ” 

“ No, ” answered the girl, standing before her aunt, pale and 
proud as herself, but with a pride that had a relenting dig- 


120 


Turned Out-of-Doors. 


nity in it, that sprang from the womanliness of her nature so 
fearfully outraged, — “no, aunt. I do not compare myself 
with you, — not for a moment. Let that Great Being make 
the comparison, who looks upon us both as we stand : you, a 
rich, proud woman, turning your sister’s child with insult 
into the street; I, a poor, friendless girl, feeble from sick- 
ness, tortured with anxiety, without shelter, and without a 
human being to care for me — let God make the comparison 
between you and me. Let him judge us two ! ” 

The young woman turned, as she spoke, and walked from 
the room, leaving her aunt standing like a statue in the clear 
gas-light. The passion of that young creature had paralyzed 
her. She, so unused to contradiction, so imperial in her 
household, had she lived to be thus braved ? What right 
had that miserable wanderer to call upon the God that she 
professed to worship ? She would not have been more as- 
tonished had a pauper knelt beside her on the velvet-clad 
steps from which she monthly communed, in the most fash- 
ionable church of the city. 

Thus astounded and overwhelmed, the woman stood, till 
the quick footsteps of her niece were lost upon the stairs ; 
then, w T ith a deep Jpeath, she sat down to compose herself, 
and even had recourse to an enamelled vinagrette that lay 
upon the toilet-table, so much had her nerves been shaken. 
All this had the desired effect, and in a few moments the 
lady was arranging the golden acorns over her dark tresses, 
gathering them in clusters where the silver threads lay thick- 
est, and stood longer than usual, regarding herself in the 
mirror with a sort of wonder that any one had dared to ad- 
dress such words to her. 

Directly a waiting-woman entered in answer to a touch 
that she had given to the bell. “ Rachel, there was a girl 
came here just now ; did you see her ? is she gone ?” 

“No, madam, she fainted in the front-hall — fell down 
like a dead creature before any one had time to show her out 
the other way.” 


121 


Turned Out-of-Boors. 

“ And where is she now ? ” 

“ Lying there white as snow, and as cold as ice ; the girls 
have been doing their best, but they cannot bring her to.” 

One gentle impulse did arise in the woman’s bosom, as 
she heard this. She seized the flask that had just soothed 
her own nerves, and moved a step toward the door ; but a 
cold after-thought drew her back. “ The girl might speak, 
might proclaim her relationship before the household if she 
were brought to consciousness under that roof. Nay, so little 
did she seem to be ashamed of the past, the girl might pro- 
claim her pauper condition before the assembled menials.” 
She laid down the flask and turned to the glass, a little paler . 
than before, but with marvellous self-possession. 

“Send for a carriage, and have her carried to the nearest 
dispensary; there should be plenty of doctors there; it is 
their duty to see to such persons.” 

“But she is insensible, madam,” persisted the waiting- 
woman, who had some feeling. 

“ That is nothing,” was the reply ; “ we cannot leave a 
strange girl lying in the hall.” 

The woman went out muttering to herself, and with angry 
ipoisture in her eyes. 4 

The lady seated herself once more, and began to arrange 
the lace of her undersleeves with considerable nervousness. 
Something of human feeling was at work in her bosom, and 
from time to time she arose and looked out of the window, 
always with increasing agitation. At last, a carriage drove 
up ; and grasping the silken curtain hard with her hand, 
she half dragged it over her, afraid to be seen watching. 
She saw, through the dim light, a group of persons carrying 
a prostrate form down the steps leading to her own door. 
The carriage-lamps flashed upon a pale face as it was lifted 
upward. The woman caught one glance and drew back 
with a thrill of dismay. The face gleamed upward so 
deathly in its whiteness that she crept from the window, 


122 


Memories and Resolutions. 


and cowered down in her sofa-cushions, tormented with the 
vague fear that the dead was appealing to heaven against 
her cruelty. For the moment, that proud woman had Ihe 
sensation of a murderess. 

She shook off this uncomfortable sensation, with a great 
effort walking the floor up and down, and muttering to 
herself, — 

“ Bellevue — Bellevue. Another from that place ! have 
they all turned paupers ? Thank heaven, however, this girl 
is gone. I could not have endured another scene like that. 
I did right; no man or woman can blame me for refusing to 
be disgraced. How those De Markes haunt me ! ” 


CHAPTER XIX. 

MEMORIES AND RESOLUTIONS. 

T HEY carried Catharine Lacy to the station-house. A 
doctor was sent for, but it was a long time before he came, 
and when he did arrive, the poor girl refused all assistance, but 
lay upon her couch, which was worse than a beggar’s, racked 
with a sense of her utter desolation, till thought caused fever, 
and fired her whole system with artificial strength. 

She spent the night without sleep, and in profound dark- 
ness, tortured with visions of her lost child, its pauper grave, 
and of its father. For the first time she thought of the 
latter with doubt and bitterness. Had he deserted her? 
She had read of these things. And her aunt, how- cruelly 
she had taken up the belief of her unworthiness. What 
had she done to be thus treated by those who should have 
protected her ? Why was she of all human beings selected 
out for Avrong and insult ? 

These were severe questions for a girl not yet eighteen 


Memories and Resolutions . 


123 


to ask of her own proud spirit, in the degrading darkness 
of a station-house; and if her soul was filled with bitterness, 
when it could make no reply, who will wonder or blame her. 

It is a terrible thing when a. warm, young heart learns to 
distrust humanity, and is thrown into the world without 
shield or buckler, to contend with that coarse reality which 
crushes out all the rich poetry of youth and leaves bitterness 
in its place. No wonder, poor inexperienced creatures, like 
Catharine, sometimes become reckless and sin against that 
society which taunts them onward by cruel and undeserved 
reproach. 

What Catharine might have done, after that night of 
fearful trial, if left wholly to herself, I cannot say ; but God 
puts no human soul upon this earth to leave it altogether 
subject to evil influences. When humanity fails, then comes 
a sweet, low voice from the throne of God, and those who 
listen grow calm and strong, as flowers brighten beneath the 
soft dew which visits them in the night-time. 

True, Catharine was an orphan, but who knows that the 
mother who has gone with all her earthly affections to heaven, 
purified and holy, is not a better guardian to the soul of her 
child than she ever could have been on earth. No, no, 
Catharine Lacy was not alone in all that night. Spirits 
hovered around her, and when waves of bitterness would 
have rushed over and filled her soul, they were swept aside, 
leaving the young girl more tranquil and strong of heart 
than she had been for months. 

The heavenly love of a mother, who had partaken of 
divinity, and that earthly love, which draws us closer to the 
gates of heaven, had watched over the young girl in her 
deepest humiliation. Toward morning, she fell asleep, with 
a fragment of the Lord’s Prayer upon her lips. It seemed 
to her in that half dreamy state, as if her parents were both 
listening as they had done years ago, and smiled to think 
that she was asking help of God once more. All day the 


124 


Memories and Resolutions. 


poor girl slept. Once or twice an officer came in to arouse 
her, but there was something so child-like and happy in her 
slumber, that he went out again, leaving her undisturbed. 

Toward nightfall, Catharine awoke, and after partaking 
of some coarse food, which the captain of police had ordered 
for her, she took up her little bundle and prepared to go 
forth into the streets again. 

Her plans were no longer in confusion. She would go to 
Madame De Marke, and ask the protection denied by her 
own relative ; this was a duty which she certainly owed to 
De Marke, before throwing herself upon the w 7 ide world. 
She had little hope of conciliating the eccentric old woman, 
but resolved for his sake to brave the interview. Very 
slowly, for she was still too feeble for much exertion, Cath- 
arine made her way down the city, strengthened by her ow r n 
steady purpose, and saved from torturous feelings of sus- 
pense by the very hopelessness of her project. 

It was nightfall before she reached her destination. The 
dim stairs, over which she trod, creaked gloomily beneath 
her light footsteps, adding to the evil foreboding that crept 
closer and closer around her heart, as she entered the shadow 
of that now half-deserted building. 

Her pace grew more rapid as she advanced, for the cour- 
age of desperation was upon her ; and her knock against 
the half-closed door of Madame De Marke s room was clear 
and firm. 

“ Who is wanting me ? ” inquired a snappish voice, and 
the door was partly opened. “ Who is it? you, Jane Kelly ? 
come in, my pet, come in. Is it good news or bad that you 
bring me ? Come in out of the passage. What keeps you 
hanging back so ? Putting on airs, eh ? making believe 
you are in no hurry for the mate to that ear-ring, the spark- 
ler? All fudge and nonsense ; just as if I did n’t understand 
it all. Come in with you — there, there, now lift your veil.” 

The old woman had drawn Catharine through the door 


Memories and Resolutions, 


125 


with great eagerness, clutching her arm with those claw-like 
fingers till the poor child almost called out with pain. She 
felt that the old woman was trembling with some emotion, 
which struck her as intense rage, and when her veil was 
drawn aside it revealed a face so pallid with affright, that 
for a moment the old woman did not recognize it. 

“What? what?” she hissed at last, as the certainty of 
her identity forced itself upon her, “ you alive and here. 
Oh ! ha ! she shall pay for this !” 

As she spoke, the wretch clutched her hand with a more 
cruel gripe around the young girl’s arm, and gave her a 
fierce shake. 

“Alive! — you alive and here ?” she repeated, “oh! but 
some one shall pay for this.” 

“ You hurt me,” said Catharine, shrinking with pain. “ I 
come to you for help ; do not harm me ! ” 

“Help! to me for help — you, you!” cried the old woman, 
drawing back and pointing her lean finger almost into Cath- 
arine’s face ; “ help you shall have. Help to the house of 
correction. I’ll help you there, certainly. You can depend 
on me. But where is the baby — the dear little infant; 
what have you done with that, eh?” 

“ It is dead ! ” answered Catharine, with simple pathos. 
“ I am all alone.” 

“So the dear little baby is dead, is it? what a pity! 
There must have been lots of mourners at the funeral. 
Why did n’t you send for me ? I’d a come with pleasure.” 

“ Don’t,” said Catharine, lifting both her hands, and hold- 
ing their palms out as if to ward off a blow, “ don’t, unless 
you wish to kill me. It was your son’s child.” 

“ My son’s child, was it ? oh ! yes, I remember now. You 
were married to my son, as you call him, the last time I saw 
you. Perhaps you will give me another sight of that pre- 
cious marriage-certificate.” 

“ Don’t ask me for it ? ” murmured Catharine. 


126 


All Alone. 


“And why not? I must look at it again and again, be- 
fore the fact will make itself clear. • Come, come, let us see 
the paper.” 

“ It is lost ! ” said Catharine, in a low voice ; “ there is 
nothing left but my word to prove that I am really and 
truly your son’s wife ! ” 


CHAPTER XX. 

ALL ALONE. 

M ADAME DE MARIvE stood a moment irresolute, 
then she spoke out. “My son! you will call the 
young reprobate De Marke, my son, as if he ever had a 
drop of my blood in his veins. I tell you he was De Marke’s 
son by a first wife, and I Well, yes, I am his step- 
mother, his father’s widow, and his guardian till, till 

But what’s the use of talking? You couldn’t under- 
stand it.” 

“ But I understand this, and thank God for it. De Marke 
is not your own son.” 

“ No more my son than he is your husband, honey-bird, 
be sure of that,” cried the old woman, with a spiteful laugh. 

Catharine’s eyes sparkled. It was something to know 
that the old woman had really no claim on her for respect. 

“ But you have always looked upon him as a son, and you 
know that I am his wife.” 

“ Indeed, how do I know that ? Let me read over the 
certificate, and then — ” 

“ He told you that we w r ere married, I am sure of it.” 

“ Oh ! they are deceivers all ; don’t put any faith in the 
blood, my dear; but just go away like a nice girl and hide 
your shame in the country. I’ll give you a trifle for travel- 


All Alone. 127 

ling expenses, and then you might make a nice match, where 
no one ever heard of you before.” 

“Hush, madam, I will not listen to this; it degrades me 
and my husband.” 

“Your husband, ha! A tender, attentive husband, ifh’t 
he? Don’t you wonder when he will come back?” m 

“ Tell me where he is gone. Oh, tell me that, and I "will 
trouble you no more ! ” 

“ Why ? what would you do ? ” 

“ I would follow him to the uttermost ends of the earth, as 
a true wife should follow the man she loves.” 

“ Would you, my dear ? But that is just what the young 
fellow does not want. He has left you, girl, and I tell you 
he will never return, never, never, do you hear ? ” 

“ I do not believe it. Sooner or later he will come back 
to contradict this wicked slander. He is not a bad man ! ” 

“ Just as you please to think, my dear ; only he is a long 
time in coming ! ” 

Catharine gave a quick motion of the hand, as if to silence 
the slander, and turning upon the old woman, demanded 
if she would give her shelter and protection ? 

“ No, no, my dear, the thing is just impossible,” answered 
the old creature, with jeering malice in her look and voice ; 
“ that would be owning to the world that I gave some faith 
to your romance about Philadelphia, the clergyman, and all 
that.” 

“ I am almost glad of it,” answered Catharine, conscious 
that a sensation of unaccountable relief went with her words. 
“Now I have nothing but God to trust in ; all his creatures 
have forsaken me.” 

“ Oh ! ” ejaculated the old woman, kissing her crucifix, 
“ what has God, or the mother of God, to do with heretics 
but to punish their sins ? Go away, dear, go away.” 

“I will,” was the sad reply. “You send me out among 
men like a wild bird into the woods, but God takes care 
even pf them.” 


128 


All Alone. 


“ That’s a nice girl, you’ll go into the country away west 
or east, where no one will ever hear of you again. Don’t 
come back to disgrace the poor boy, and I’ll pay your pas- 
sage in the emigrant cars just as far as you will go. Only 
letf*it be a long way olf, and remember, dear, how much it 
wilbcqst me.” 

“ No,” answered Catharine, “ I cannot leave the city till 
he comes back.” 

“I tell you he never will come back, never! You hear 
me, never ! never ! ” 

Catharine turned very white, and clenched her little hand 
hard on the back of a chair. 

“ How do you know this, madam ? ” she questioned, in a 
faint voice. 

“ He told me so himself, dear ; depend on it, he never will 
come back, and never can marry you ; it would make him a 
beggar.” 

“Why?” 

“Why, darling? because his father just left it in his will 
that his son should never marry without my consent ; if he 
did, all the property should come to me. So, my dear, you 
understand how it would turn out if you were really mar- 
ried ; he would be a beggar, and I rolling in gold — rolling 
in gold. Oh, if you only had been married, now would n’t 
it have been a run of luck for me ? But he won’t do it — 
not fool enough for that — never thought of such a thing.” 

“ Do you mean to say that George has practised a de- 
ception on me?” 

“ Oh, a little cheat, nothing else, of course you understand 
all about it ; the certificate that you made so much of, all 
fudge and nonsense. Just go away, darling, as I tell you; 
he ’ll never come back till you do, and never then, I dare say.” 

Catharine held by the chair still trembling from head to 
foot. In all her trouble she had possessed one source of con- 
solation and strength — deep faith in her husband’s love and 


All Alone. 


129 


integrity. Now her very heart seemed uprooted. For a moment, 
she had no faith in anything. % She leaned heavily on the 
chair, grasping it with both hands, but her limbs trembled 
and gave way ; she sunk slowly downward, and bowing her 
face, cried out in bitter anguish : 

“ Oh, my God, what have I done that all Thy creatures 
turn against me ? Let me die — let me die ! ” 

Madame De Marke turned away. At the head of her cot 
was a small hen-coop such as farmers use in transporting 
poultry to market. Through the bars of this coop, two or 
three lank, hungry fowls were protruding their long necks, 
and set up a low chuckle as if they joined the old woman 
in mocking at the poor girl. “ Ha, ha ! you understand it, 
dears,” said the crone ; “here now, my pets, help yourselves.” 

She went to a platter that stood on her deal table, and 
dividing a cold potato with her fingers, thrust half of it 
through the bars. As the hungry fowls devoured it, she 
began quietly eating the other half, while she eyed the poor 
girl with a look of malicious cunning, apparently quite un- 
mindful of the anguish that made her very heart quiver. 

At last Catharine lifted her head and looked steadily at 
the old woman. “Madam, if you have deceived me in this, 
if you know this of my husband.” She paused — the name 
almost suffocated her; goaded with fresh agony, she arose to 
her feet. 

“ Woman, woman, as you have dealt with us, so will the 
God of heaven deal with you on your death-bed ! ” 

The next instant Catharine Lacy passed through the door, 
as one flees from an impending death-blow. 

Madame De Marke looked after her with a wild, fierce look; 
then she snatched up her crucifix and kissed it. 

“ A heretic, a heretic — why should I mind the words of a 
heretip"? What right has she to call on God ?” 

But her grim features worked with fear long after she 
ceased speaking, and she repeatedly kissed the crucifix in 
her hand, as if striving to bribe protection from it. 


130 


Diamond cut Diamond . 


CHAPTER XXI. 

DIAMOND CUT DIAMOND. 

S CARCELY half an hour had elapsed, when there was 
another knock at the door, and Jane Kelly, the hospital 
nurse, presented herself. 

“ Oh, you have come at last! ” exclaimed the old woman. 
“ What news this time?” 

“I have come for the other ear-ring; it’s all right this 
time!” 

“Dead?” 

“ Yes, dead, I gave him to my favorite nurse. The Irish 
woman wanted him dreadfully, and made a fuss at head- 
quarters, but I proved that she lay in a dead sleep from 
drinking the very night before we sent her home, so my 
woman got the child and kept it to the last.” 

“ And it is dead, ha ? ” 

Jane nodded her head. “ Paregoric for breakfast, cor- 
dial between whiles, and laudanum at night ; that nurse al- 
ways has quiet babies ; can lay ’em down anywhere in a 
corner or on a shelf. If they wake up and cry, more drops ; 
you can’t think how nat’rally they go to the other sleep at 
last ; it’s quite beautiful.” 

“But this one ? don’t talk of sleep, — is it dead?” 

“ As a door-nail ! ” 

“ La — a,” ejaculated the old woman, with a sort of dis- 
trustful exultation, “if I could believe you now ! ” 

Jane fired up in an instant. 

“ I see — this is to get rid of paying over the other ear- 
ring ; but it won’t do, I’m not to be taken in that way. 
Goodness knows the whole set would n’t half pay me for the 
trouble and risk, to say nothing of one’s soul. So it’s no 


Diamond cut Diamond. * 131 

use putting on airs, I’ve earned the ear-rings, and I mean to 
have ’em.” 

“ There now, dear, there now, what an ado you are making, 
and all for nothing at all ; dear me, who said a word about 
not giving you the ring? but the mate, just let me see that, 
and we will put them together. Earned them? indeed I 
think you have, dear, and more than that by a good deal. 
Certainly, my dear, you shall have more than that.” 

“Oh, thank you! I deserve it, at any rate, though the 
girl did escape.” 

“ Deserve it, my pet, of course you do, and twice as much ; 
but give me the ear-ring.” 

“ Not exactly ! ” answered Jane Kelly, “ I was not fool 
enough to bring it here.” 

“ Then you have n’t it about you ?” 

“No, why should I ? ” 

“Oh, no, why should you — but you have n’t pawned or 
sold it, have you?” 

“Of course I have n’t; none of your fine ladies will get a 
chance to flourish in them diamond ear-rings now, I tell you ; 
they cost too much for that, and what I’ve earned I can af- 
ford to wear as well as the best on ’em.” 

“ But why did n’t you put it in your ear to-night? I should 
just like to see ’em sparkling each side of them rosy cheeks; 
why, it ’d be a treat to see them and your eyes a-flashing 
together. I wish you’d brought ’em, dear.” 

“Well,” answered Jane, smoothing back her hair, with 
great complacency, “ it’s no use talking about it now, for 
one ear-ring is safe in my trunk, at the hospital, and the 
other, you know, is somewhere in the room here, so it stands 
to reason they can’t outshine my two eyes to-night.” 

“Oh, ho!” ejaculated madame, softly; “in your trunk; 
well, I should a thought it would have been safer in your 
pocket.” 

“ Not at all. I keep the store-room key myself, and no 


132 


Diamond cut Diamond . 


one gets to my trunk now, I tell you. The matron would 
give her eyes to see what ’s in it ; but, no ; close bind, close 
find, is my motto.” 

“ And so you must have the mate to that ring to-night ? ” 
said Madame De Marke, after a moment’s reflection. 

“ Must have the mate to that ring to-night,” repeated 
Jane, with a self-confident toss of the head. 

“Well, now, how sorry I am, dear; but the room isn’t 
safe for things so costly, you know, and it was only yester- 
day I sent it down to the bank.” 

“Indeed!” drawled Jane Kelly, eying her friend dis- 
trustfully ; “ so you are certain there is no mistake about 
the bank It don’t happen to be under the bed now, in a 
little morocco box, inside of one with iron clamps?” 

“ What, what ! ” exclaimed the old woman, starting 
up fiercely, “you know this; you have been peeping 
and prying about my room, eh? But it isn’t there; 
I sent boxes and all down to the bank ; so you can try at 
your game there; perhaps you’ve got a skeleton-key, or 
something of that sort.” 

“ No,” said Jane, rising in a fury ; “ but I’ve got the 
power to make you suffer, and I will, if that ear-ring is n’t 
forthcoming by to-morrow night. My oath is good yet, and 
one picks up a little law now and then in the institution. 
It’s no joke to bribe a person to murder.” 

“ Ha ! you’re cute, dear — very cute ; so you will make 
oath to that, eh? ” 

“Yes, I will make oath to that, if the diamond ear-ring 
in my trunk has n’t a mate by this time to-morrow night.” 

“ But you forget,” cried the old woman, “ that the baby is 
dead .” 

“Not at all, Madame De Marke; I recommended the 
nurse ; that was all. She has had plenty of children before 
from the Almshouse.” 

Madame De Marke moved restlessly in her seat, and a 


133 


The Odd Ear-ring. 

look of crafty thought stole oyer her face. At last she be- 
gan to smile, and winding her fingers softly around each 
other, as if caressing herself for a pleasant idea, she said : 

“ Oh, very well, to-morrow night you may come again ; 
everything shall be ready. You and I are not going to 
quarrel, dear ; come to-morrow night ; that’s a dear.” 

“Yes, I will come,” answered Jane, brusquely; “depend 
on that.” 

She arose, and, folding the shawl around her, with a defi- 
ant air, went out, muttering: “Yes, yes, we’ll settle this 
business to-morrow night, no mistake about that.” 

After she was gone, Madame stood for a moment listen- 
ing, till the sound of her footsteps died on the stairs ; then 
she dragged forth the iron-bound box, took out the odd ear- 
ring, and thrust it in her bosom. Snatching up a queer old 
bonnet, with a crown like a muskmellon, and a front like a 
sugar-scoop, she framed her witch-like face in it, and stole 
out of the chamber, treading like a cat, and, in reality, ap- 
pearing to see in the dark like one. 


CHAPTER XXII. 

THE ODD EAR-RING. 

J ANE KELLY had proceeded but a few paces from the 
outer door, when Madame reached the pavement. Very 
few persons were in the street at that time of the evening ; for, 
though not very late, the building was deep in the commer- 
cial heart of the city, and few persons ever spent the night 
there. 

“ Oh, there he is.” 

As the old woman uttered these words, she darted across 
the street and seized a policeman by the arm. 


134 


The Odd Ear-ring . 


“Burglary — burglary! I have been robbed. The thief 
has been trying at my door again ; I have tracked her now. 
There the woman goes ; seize her ! seize her ! she has robbed 
me of a diamond ear-ring ; I swear it, I am ready to testify ; 
here is the mate ; seize her, or she will be off.” 

As she spoke, the old woman drew the ear-ring from her 
bosom and held it up in the light of a street-lamp. The 
man gave one glance at the sparkling stones, and darted 
after Jane Kelly, who was gliding off like a shadow in the 
distance. 

Madame put up her jewel, and followed the policeman, 
chuckling softly to herself. 

“ Is this the person ? ” said the policeman, leading Jane 
Kelly back, with a strong grasp on her arm. “ Have I 
caught the right bird ? ” 

“ That is the woman,” replied the old He Marke, peering 
into Jane’s face, “I should know her among a thousand. I 
caught her in my room, not ten minutes ago, robbing my 
money-box; picked the door-lock when I was out buying 
groceries ; had this very ear-ring in her hand ; you’ll find 
the box open on the floor, just as she left it. I trod softly, 
^ light as a feather, darted in upon her, snatched this from 
her hand — she ran — I after her, and here she is ! ” 

Jane Kelly stood before her accuser as she uttered these 
charges, dumb with astonishment, and pale with dismay. 
She looked from the policeman to the old woman and back 
again with a wild stare. 

“What is the witch at now? ” she said, at last, in a fright- 
ened voice, wincing under the grasp fixed on her arm. “ Let 
me go, I have n’t done nothing; I’m a hired nurse at Belle- 
vue Hospital — a paid nurse, do you understand ? ” 

“ Is she ? ” inquired the man, turning to Madame de Marke. 

“ Don’t know anything about her, sir ; saw her hanging 
about my building about ten days ago, first and last time I 
ever saw her till now. That night I walked in the streets 


135 


The Odd Ear-ring . 

from twelve o’clock at night till three in the morning, the 
priest made me do it as a penance; when I got home, the 
mate to this was gone from my money-box ; to-night she came 
after another haul ! ” 

Jane Kelly turned upon her fierce and pale. “Woman, 
you lie ! ” broke from lips that trembled so with fear and 
passion that the words came almost in a whisper. 

“ Of course I do ; no one ever told the truth about a thief ; 
of course it’s all a story, perhaps the magistrate ’ll think 
so.” 

“ You do not mean to have me really taken up ? ” 

“Of course not; you’ve committed burglary on my pre- 
mises, robbed me of diamonds worth five hundred dollars, 
and tried to do it again ; but of course I a’n’t going to take 
you up, dear. Perhaps I’m tender-hearted, perhaps I love 
you too much, perhaps you’ll be marched off to the police 
office without another minute’s time for abusing me ! Mr. 
Policeman, just move on, I am ready. It is n’t too late yet, 
and I want to get home again ! ” 

“ I won’t go — I charge that woman with murder, perjury, 
false imprisonment. She’s an imp, a wretch, a wild beast, I 
tell you ; take her up, I charge her with something worse than 
stealing.” 

Jane struggled fiercely as she hurled these words back 
upon her accuser, and almost wrenched her arm from the 
policeman. 

“Hush, be quiet, I say!” commanded the man, sternly, 
“ I’ll have no more of this ; come along, marm, we’ve held 
court long enough in the street. If we wait in this way, the 
magistrate will be gone.” 

“ Oh, I’m ready, I’m in a hurry to go,” said Madame, with 
her glittering eyes turned on Kelly ; “ it is n’t me that de- 
lays you ; walk on, I’ll follow with all the pleasure in the 
world ; perhaps she’s got the mate to this about her ! ” 

“No such thing,” exclaimed Jane, with another burst of 


136 The Odd Ear-ring. 

passion, “ you know well enough that I told you it was in 
my trunk.” 

“Oh!” ejaculated the officer, with a wink at the old 
woman, who gave back a significant nod, and cast another 
jeering glance at her victim. 

“ Did you tell me that? thank you, dear, it ’s pleasant to 
find a person so frank. You hear, sir, she confesses. Kind, 
is n’t it?” 

Jane was about to speak, and probably in her wrath might 
have committed herself still further, but the policeman 
dragged her forward. She made a little resistance at first, 
but at last moved on more patiently, though still burning 
with indignation, which was likely to break forth to her dis- 
advantage the moment she was allowed to speak again. 

Madame De Marke seemed to be aware of this, for though 
she appeared to follow the officer and his charge, every few 
minutes she would glide up to the side of her victim, and 
whisper some taunt or jeer that stung the woman’s wrath 
into fresh vigor, and in this state she was placed before the 
magistrate. 

The moment she entered the police-office, Madame De 
Marke changed her whole manner ; the glitter of her eyes was 
subdued, her demeanor became quiet, and notwithstanding 
her mean garments and general untidiness, there was some- 
thing about her which bespoke a knowledge of good society 
and its usages. Besides, her face bpre evidence of a keen 
intellect, the more remarkable from the squalid poverty of 
her appearance. 

She advanced before the judge, and made her charge in a 
clear, truthful manner, that left no room for doubt, though 
the magistrate seemed a good deal astonished by the value 
of the property stolen; and when Madame, with her. usual 
boast, spoke of rolling in gold, an incredulous smile stole 
across his lips. 

Madame De Marke saw the smile, and a little of her natu- 
ral shrewishness broke forth. 


137 


The Odd Ear-ring. 

“You don’t believe me; you think, perhaps, I stole the 
things first myself,” she said, sharply. 

“ No, I do not trouble myself to think of anything that has 
not taken the form of evidence,” said the judge, smiling 
with an expression that Madame liked still less than the 
first ; “ to-morrow we will look into the case, if you appear 
against the woman.” 

“ But you will lock her up — you will not allow her to go 
home? ’’cried the old woman, eagerly; “ she will hide my 
diamonds away, and I shall never see them again ! ” 

The magistrate waved his hand, as if to silence further 
speech, and writing on a slip of paper, handed it to the 
officer. 

“Come,” said the officer, touching Jane. 

The woman turned sharply upon him. 

“ Where are you taking me ? ” 

“Into another wing of the Tombs: don’t make a disturb- 
ance now, but come peaceably.” 

“Not unless this old Jezebel goes with me,” cried the 
woman, furiously. “ I tell you, she is ten thousand times 
worse than a thief; she wanted me to commit murder — to let 
one of the sweetest creatures that ever lived starve on her 
sick-bed ; she tried to bribe me with that very ear-ring. I tell 
you, gentlemen, she is more of a murderer than I am a thief 
ten times over ! ” 

She was interrupted by a laugh, low and quiet, but w r hicb 
shook Madarae’s meagre form from head to foot. 

“ Pleasant charges, very,” she observed, addressing the 
magistrate; “perhaps I stole my own jewels.” 

“ I should n’t wonder,” murmured the judge, scarcely 
above his breath, but Madame heard it. 

“Yes,” she added, “and perhaps I engraved my own 
name on the back.” 

She held out the ear-ring, and the judge saw G. De Marke 
engraved on the antique setting. He had heard the name, 


138 


A Friend in Need. 


and now gazed with great curiosity on its owner, for with all 
her apparent poverty he knew her to be one of the weal- 
thiest women in New York. He handed back the ear-ring 
with a bow, and waving his hand, ordered the prisoner to 
be removed. 


CHAPTER XXIII. 

A FRIEND IN NEED. 

$ 

A LONE in the streets of a great city, in the night-time — 
so young, so beautiful, without a home, a dollar, or a 
friend, what could the poor girl do ? ” 

Utter hopelessness is almost rest. Catharine could not 
understand this, and wondered within herself at the strange 
apathy that possessed her is this the most forlorn moment 
of her life. 

She wandered on, careless of the direction, without object 
and dreamily. Once or twice she sat down on a door-step 
to rest, but it was only for a moment, and when she arose it 
was to forget that a transient repose had been obtained. 
At last in the drear waste of her thoughts she remembered 
the Irish woman who had been so kind to her at Bellevue, 
and around this thought centred other reflections that almost 
amounted to a resolution. But even this emotion died away 
when she reflected, that, kind as the woman was, there existed 
no means of ascertaining exactly where she lived. 

Still Catharine wandered on ; what else could she do ? 
Even from the door-steps she might at any moment be 
driven forth as an intruder. It was evidently getting late ; 
the noises of city life were gradually hushed, and the grow- 
ing stillness appalled her. Never, in her whole existence, 
had she been so utterly alone. 


A Friend in Need. 


139 


Awaking from her apathy, as it were from a dull dream, 
she found herself upon the corner of two thoroughfares, on 
the east side of' the town. The stores were all closed, and 
the streets on either hand almost deserted. 

“ Where can I go ? — what will become of me ? ” she 
murmured, looking around with affright. “Will no one 
have pity on me ? ” 

That moment a woman passed her carrying a basket of 
clothes on her arm. 

“ She is going home,” said Catharine, gazing after her 
through the blinding tears that filled her eyes. 

“ Did you speak to me, ma’am ? ” inquired the woman, 
turning back at the sound of her voice. 

A faint cry broke from the poor girl, and seizing the 
woman joyfully by the arm, she called out. 

“ Oh, is it you? — is it you?” 

Mary Margaret Dillon sat down her basket in utter aston- 
ishment, and seizing the hand that detained her, shook it 
heartily. 

“ Well, if this isn’t something, innyhow; me jist thinking 
of ye, and here ye are to the fore ; but ye ’re looking white as 
me apron yet, bad luck to the doctors — come by, and let us 
have a word of talk togither.” 

“Will you let me go with you?” inquired Catharine, 
anxiously, for she had been so often and so cruelly rebuffed 
that this kindness scarcely seemed real. 

“ Will I let ye go with me,blessye’resowl; that ’s a ques- 
tion to put to a Christian woman, now, is n’t it ? In course 
I’ll let ye go with me; why not?” 

“ But I have no home, nor a cent to pay for — for — every- 
body has abandoned me — I have n’t a friend in the wide 
world.” 

“Hist, now, that’s talkin’ traison and rank hathenism. 
Where d’ye think is Mary Margaret Dillon, with her strong 
hands and a shanty over her head which no one else has a 


140 


A Friend in Need. 


right to, baring a triflin’ claim on the lot o’ ground. Isn’t 
that a home for ye, I’d like to know ?” 

“But I shall be trouble — I shall crowd you,” faltered 
Catharine, trembling with anxiety to have her objections 
overruled. 

“ Did ye ever see a poor man’s house so full that one more 
couldn’t find a corner to rest in — faix, if ye did, it was n’t 
in the cabin of an out-and-out Irishman,” said Margaret, 
lifting her basket of clothes and settling herself for a walk. 
“ Come along ; I want ye to see the childer, bliss ’em, and the 
old mon, to say nothin’ of the pig and three geese, that ’ll 
be proud as anythin’ to have ye for company.” 

“Thank you — oh, thank you with all my heart. I will 
go ; perhaps I can do something to pay for the trouble,” said 
Catharine, to whom this vision of a home seemed like a 
glimpse of paradise; and folding her shawl about her, she 
prepared to move on with a feeling almost of cheerfulness, 
certainly of intense gratitude. 

“ No trouble in life,” answered Margaret, briskly. “ The 
old man and the childer ’ll just resave ye as if ye was one 
of ’em. Come along, come along, and we ’ll have a taste of 
supper and a drop of tae as a remimbrance of this matein 
atween old friends, d ’ye see ? ” 

“ Let me help with your basket.” 

“ No, no, jist be aisy there ; ye’re not strong enough for 
that, and faix it ’s a sin and a shame that sich a dilicate 
young crathur should iver be put to the work ; home or not, 
my opinion is ye’re a born lady, and that I’ll stick to agin 
the world.” 

They walked on together, Margaret talking cheerfully, 
and Catharine mingling some painful thoughts with her 
gratitude. 

“ Mary Margaret,” she said, at length, in a low, mournful 
voice, “ you will never turn against me, as the others have, 
because I cannot give you proof that — that the poor baby 


A Friend in Need . 141 

they buried away from me was honestly mine; you will 
take my word- for it, I feel almost sure !” 

“ I don’t want ye’r word ; one look in ye’r purty face is 
enough for me, and I’d stand up for ye agin the whole uni- 
varse, with old Ireland to the fore.” 

“Thank you — God bless you for that,” answered Cath- 
arine, and for the first time in many days a smile broke 
over her face. “You are so honest and so kind, Margaret, 
I could not bear that you should think ill of me.” 

Margaret did not answer at once, but walked on thought- 
fully. 

“ In course,” she said at last, “I belave ivery word ye tell 
me; but if it wasn’t so — if ye had been a poor, desaved 
crathur instid of the swate innicent ye are, I would n’t turn, 
agin ye anyhow. It ain’t Christian, and, accordin’ to my 
idees, it ain’t modest for a woman to hold a poor, fallen 
feller crathur down in the gutter foriver and iver. The 
blissed Saviour, who was holier than us all, didn’t do it, and, 
by all the holy saints, Mary Margaret Dillon niver will 
either.” 

Catharine drew a deep sigh. 

“ Don’t sigh in that way, darlint,” exclaimed Margaret, 
kindly. “ D’ ye know that ivery time ye draw a deep breath 
like that it drinks a drop of blood from ye’r heart? Don’t 
sigh agin, that ’s a darlint.” 

“ I was thinking,” replied Catharine, “ how much worse 
it would have ended if I had really been so wicked as they 
think I am ; it seems to me as if I must have laid down on 
the first door-step and died. Nothing but my own sense of 
right has given me strength to live — and after all, what 
have I to live for now ?” 

“ Hist, darlint, hist, this is talkin’ like a hathen. Ye’re 
to live because the blissid Saviour thinks it’s good for ye, and 
that’s enough for a Christian. Besides, it ’s mane and low- 
lived to give way, wid the first dash' of trouble, especially 


142 


Mary Margaret Dillon’s Shanty . 

when we see every day that the Saviour makes ye strong and 
more determined.” 

Catharine submitted to this rebuke for her momentary re- 
pining with gentle patience, The simple piety and honest 
good sense of Mary Margaret *had its effect upon her, and 
.before she reached the shanty w T here the good woman lived, 
something of hopefulness sprang up in her heart. She could 
not help feeling that there was something providential in her 
encounter with the good Irishwoman at the moment of her 
utmost need. This gave strength to many hopeful impulses 
that are always latent in the bosom of the young. 


CHAPTER XXIV. 

MARY MARGARET DILLON’S SHANTY. 

T HE shanty to which Mary Margaret conducted her 
guest stood in a vacant lot, high up in the city. It 
v T as a rustic affair, composed of boards mingled with the odds 
and ends from old buildings, that Michael Dillon had been 
engaged in demolishing during his experience as a laboring 
man. Indeed, Michael was a very favorable specimen of 
metropolitan squatter sovereignty, and had succeeded in 
securing no inconsiderable means of creature comfort around 
him, though another man was owner of the soil. He had 
managed, when out of work, to wall in a little patch of land, 
in a rude, loose way, it is true, which he denominated the 
garden, and some dozen or two of fine cabbages, as many 
hills of potatoes, and a cucumber vine, where great, plethoric, 
yellow cucumbers were ripening for seeds, gave color and 
force to Michael’s assumption. 

In addition to these substantial, Mary Margaret had con- 
tributed her share of the useful and picturesque by planting 


143 


Mary Margaret Dillon’s Shanty . 

nasturtians all along the low, stone wall, which clothed the 
rude structure with a sheet of gorgeous blossoms, and gave 
it the look of an immense garland flung upon the ground. 

Thus hedging her husband’s usefulness in with flowers, 
the province of a true woman, Mary Margaret had helped 
to w T in a gleam of the beautiful from the rude, stony soil 
from w T hich Michael strove to wrest a portion of their daily 
food. 

I have often thought that true goodness, in a woman, at 
least, is always accompanied with glimmerings of fine taste. 
Certain it is, Mary Margaret had managed to impart no 
common show of rustic effect to her little, board shanty. Its 
door and simple window were entwined with morning-glories 
and scarlet runners that took the morning sunshine beauti- 
fully, and on a rainy day shed gleams of red and purple all 
over the front of the shanty, tangling themselves and peep- 
ing out in unexpected crevices even among the slabs ou the 
roof. Indeed, they encroached on the province of a mock- 
orange, that for two years had kept possession of the roof, 
and the sturdy vine was obliged to drop its golden fruit 
among the purple and red bells of the morning-glory, and 
even to creep off to the back of the shanty, where no one 
could see the richness and symmetry of its fruits. 

Then there was a sweet-briar bush indigenous to the 
soil, at one end of her dwelling, which Mary Margaret had 
pruned and caressed into profuse luxuriance; though it 
was dark, the scent of this bush greeted Catharine as she 
approached the shanty; with this pleasant sensation she 
entered her new home almost cheerfully. 

The shanty was' divided by a board partition into two 
small rooms, not so untidy as to be repulsive, but rather 
close to one entering from the fresh night air. The ante- 
room contained a bed, in which Mary Margaret’s sterner 
half lay sound asleep, after a hard day’s toil beneath the 
hod. 


144 


Mary Margaret Dillon’s Shanty . 

“ Whist a bit, while I light the lamp,” said Mary Margaret, 
raking the embers in a portable furnace so hurriedly together 
that the sparks flew all around her, “let the ould man slape 
his fill ; he must be up and at work by six in the morning.” 

Catharine hardly drew her breath, for she was seized with 
terror lest the sleeping man should awake and resent her 
intrusion into his dwelling. 

“ Sit down foment the furnace, while I boil a sup of water 
for the tay,” whispered the hostess, kindling her tin lamp ; 
“jist give Michael’s coat and hat a toss and take the chair 
yersel’; faix! ye look tired and white enough for anything.” 

Catharine sat down, for she was indeed quite exhausted, 
and relieved of the anxiety that had tortured her so long, 
she almost fell asleep while Mary Margaret made her tea, 
and cut the loaf which had been carefully put aside for the 
family breakfast. 

There was not much refinement in Mary Margaret’s method 
of serving up her meals; but she certainly made an effort to 
render things rather genteel than otherwise. A clean sheet, 
taken from a pile of clothes ready to be sent home, was 
folded twice and laid on the table for a cloth, and Mary 
brought forth an old china cup in an earthenware saucer, 
which she garnished with a pewter spoon, as an especial 
honor to her guest. 

As for herself, she sipped her portion of the “ tay ” dain- 
tily from a little tin cup that belonged to the youngest child. 

With all its drawbacks, this was a delicious meal to poor 
Catharine, and she partook of it with a sense of gratitude 
so full and gushing that it amounted almost to happiness. 
Two or three times she turned her eyes upon Mary Margaret 
and made an effort to thank her, but the words were lost in 
a glow of emotions, and she could only falter out, — 

“ Oh, Mrs. Dillon, how I want to thank you for all this, 
but no human being ever was so poor, I have not even 
words.” 


145 


Mary Margaret Dillon’ s Shanty. 

She spoke with some energy, and before Mrs. Dillon could 
protest against all this waste of gratitude, which she was just 
attempting, a cry arose from the bed on one side of Dillon, 
which was echoed by a half-smothered response from under 
the blankets close by the wall. 

Catharine started to her feet. The faintest cry of an 
infant was enough to thrill every drop of blood in her veins. 

“Whose — whose child is that?” she inquired, breath- 
lessly ; “ surely I heard two voices ! ” 

“ In course ye did, and why not?” said Margaret, with a 
baby under one arm, while she plunged about among the 
blankets for the little creature next the wall. “ Come out 
here, little felly, and show yer blue eyes to the lady. Is n’t 
he a beauty, out and out?” 

Catharine held out her arms for the child, who turned his 
great blue eyes wonderingly upon the lamp, while the poor 
young creature was striving to fix them on herself, for her 
very soul yearned toward the little creature. But the child 
was obstinate, and gave itself up to admiration of the lamp, 
while she sat gazing on it through a mist of tears, so sadly, 
wrapped in fond sorrow, that you would have wept at the 
very attitude. 

“Whose — whose is it?” she asked; “both cannot be 
■yours.” 

“ Ye ’re right in that entirely,” answered Margaret, pouring 
some milk into the tin cup she had been drinking from and 
placing it on the embers in the furnace. “It’s the nurse 
1 ye have.” 

‘ ^nd who is its mother ? ” faltered Catharine, pressing the 
child fondly to her bosom, and laying her pale cheek to its 
warm little face. 

“Ye remember the poor young crathur that had the cot 
next to yours, -and the baby they took away from yez ? ” 

“Yes, oh, yes.” 

“She died, poor, misfortunate soul! and only that I 


146 


Mary Margaret Dillon’s Shanty . 

would n’t stand by and see the baby starve to death by her 
side, it might have been buried on her bosom. I had a fight 
wid the nurse, bad luck to her ! but the doctor stood by me, 
and so the little thing got a fair start in the world before he 
came to you. Faix! but she’s a wicked crathur, that nurse.” 

“I believe she was — I am sure of it!” answered Catha- 
rine, in a mournful undertone. “Do you know I some- 
times think that my own poor little baby might have lived, 
if she had taken care of it ? Such a large, beautiful — ah, 
if it had but lived — if it had but lived, nothing could make 
me quite miserable ! Mrs. Dillon, poor, helpless, and de- 
serted as I am, I would give the whole world, if it were 
mine, only to hold his child in my arms as I do this poor, 
little motherless baby. He has left me — he has left me, 
but I know that I should worship his child.” 

“Hist, now hist, or ye’ll be after wakin’ the old man, 
though he does not sleep like a pavin’-stone in general ; and 
ye’ll be afther breakin’ the heart in me busom, too, if ye 
take so on. Here, feed the poor baby wid a dhrop of the 
warm milk, while I give this little spalpeen a turn. It ’ll 
aise your heart, never fear!” 

Here Mary Margaret began shaking her boy, and scold- 
ing him heartily for greediness, bringing various charges 
against him as a young spalpeen and a thaif of the worldt. 
In this torrent of superfluous words, the tears that had been 
crowding to her eyes were dispersed, and she sat up, a 
strong-minded woman once more. 

“Ye asked me about the baby there,” she said, at length, 
without appearing to notice the tears that filled poor Catha- 
rine’s eyes. “ That hathenish nurse was nigh gettin’ the up- 
per hands of me. You remember how she let on to the 
doctor that it was drinkin’ I’d been when the heavy sickness 
fell on me after takin’ a sup of yer medicine, and he, poor 
innocent, belaved her, an’ took away the child that I was 
fpn4 of a’niost as if it was my own flesh and blood.” 


147 


Mary Margaret Dillon’s Shanty. 

Catharine looked up and inquired how it came about that 
she got the child back again. 

“ This is the way/’ answered Margaret. “ I did not like 
the woman that nurse Kelly gave the little orphan to when 
ye begged so hard to keep it. The heart in my bosom felt 
like a cold stone when I saw her gathering it up like a bun- 
dle under her shawl. There was starvation and murther in 
her face; more than that, she was faregathing wid nurse 
Kelly, an’ that was another rason agin her. Well, wid 
these feelins I could n’t eat or sleep wid thinkin’ of the 
child, for it seemed to me as plain as the sun that some 
harm was coming to the little soul. So afore they sent me 
away from the hospital I inquired, aisy, ye know, where the 
woman that had got me baby lived, and it turned out that 
an acquaintance of my own was in the same tinament. 
When a week was over, I went to visit my acquaintance — 
d’ye see — and in an aisy sort o’ way asked about the 
woman and the baby. It was just as I had thought ; the 
woman was niver at home, but went out to her reglar day’s 
work, laving the poor little orphan all alone in a basket, 
sound asleep, in consequence of the laud’num and them 
soothin’-drops. I went into the room to see it, and there it 
lay in an old basket on a heap of rags, wid its little eyes 
shut, and a purple ring under ’em. It had famished away 
till its own mother, if she had' lived, would n’t a known it. 

“Well, I couldn’t stand that, so without sayin’ a word I 
up an’ takes the crathur in my arms, and walks off to the 
Alms house in the Park, and there I laid the child that 
still slept like a log, dowrn afore the gintlemen that sit there 
for the good o’ the poor, ivery day of the blessed year, and 
says I, — 

“ ‘ Are ye magestrates and gintlemen,’ says I, ‘ to sit here 
while the poor orphan childer that ye should be fathers to,’ 
says I, * are bein’ starved and poisoned with black dhrops 
under yer honorable noses? ’says I. Wid that, afore the 


148 Mary Margaret Dillon's Shanty. 

gintlemen could say a word for themselves, I unfolded the 
rags that the baby was wrapped in, and laid its little legs an’ 
arms huddled together like a fagot afore ’em, and says I 
agin,— 

“ ‘ Look here, if yese got the heart for it, an’ see for yer- 
selves.’ 

“Thin one of the gintlemen up an’ spoke for himself, and 
says he, — 

“‘The nurses are all compelled to bring their children 
here for inspection once in two weeks, an’ the time has but 
just gone by. How can this be?’ an’ he was mighty sorry 
an’ put out, I could see that plain enough. 

“‘Yes,’ says I, ‘that’s the truth,’ says I, ‘but it’s aisy 
enough to borry a show-baby when ivery house where these 
poor orphans go is runnin’ over wid ’em, and young babies 
are all alike as peas in a pod,’ says I, ‘ and it must be a cute 
man to know any of ’em from one time to another. Just 
wait a bit,’ says I, ‘if ye don’t belave me, and I’ll show you 
the very baby that was brought here in the place of this. 
It’s a plump, hearty little felly, and belongs to an acquaint- 
ance of my own.’ 

“ ‘ Can this be true ? ’ says one of the gintlemen to another. 

“ ‘True as the gospel,’ says I, spakin’ up boldly, ‘ ye’ve been 
praisen that hathen of a nurse for a baby that did n’t belong 
til ye, and this poor thing has been starved down to nothin’.’ 

“‘Well,’ says the gintleman, for he was a rale gintleman, 
says he, ‘ I’ll send an officer for this woman, and she shall 
never, to her dying day, have another child from this de- 
partment. But what can we do wid the poor infant? We 
must send for a nurse that can be trusted at once.’ 

“ Thin my heart ris into my mouth, and I hugged the 
baby to me, and says I, wid the tears in my eyes, says I, 
‘ Let me have the child to nurse, I’ll be a mother til it, an’ 
more too, if that’ll satisfy ye.’ 

“Well, the long and short of it was, they thanked me 


149 


Mary Margaret Dillon's Shanty. 

kindly for cornin’, and give me the baby, wid a dollar a week 
for takin’ care of it. So when the nurse came home, expectin’ 
to find it dead in its basket, there was nothin’ for her but a 
bundle of rags, and a perlice officer to take her down to the 
Park.” 

“ Thank God ! ” exclaimed Catharine, with a burst of 
gratitude, kissing the child again and again. “ It was a 
brave act, Mrs. Dillon, and the child will live to bless you 
for it as — as I do.” 

“ In course he will,” replied Mary Margaret, “ for it ’s just 
a miracle the saints might wonder at that he lived at all. 
At first, ye see, considerin’ his starvin’ condition, I just give 
me own little felly the could shoulder, and turned him over 
to the tin porriger ; but he got on well enough, niver fear ; 
and the little stranger begun to thrive as ye niver seen in 
yer born days.” 

“ He has indeed found a kind mother,” said Catharine, 
thoughtfully. “But how long will they let you keep him ? ” 

“ Well, it’s two years that they put the babies to nurse. 
I’m tould,” answered Mary, reluctantly. 

“ And after that ? ” 

“ Thin they are sent up to the Almshouse, and after that 
bound out ; if they happen to be killing purty like this one, 
maybe some rich gintleman or lady up and adopts ’em and 
makes a lord of ’em entirely. Some day you and I will see 
them blue eyes a-looking at us through a carriage-windy, 
and I’ll be bound he’ll bow and smile as if we were the real 
quality itself.” 

Catharine became very thoughtful during this prophecy, 
and turned her eyes away from the child, as if its innocent 
face gave her pain. 

“ Niver mind,” interposed her hostess, interpreting her 
look with that subtile magnetism with which one true wo- 
manly heart reads another. 

“ A great many things may happen in two years, with the 
13 * 


150 


Seeking for Help. 


blessings of the saints, so don’t be getting down-hearted ; 
there’s a God above all ! ” 

“ I know it,” answered Catharine, gazing with sad tender- 
ness on the child ; “ but it makes my heart ache to think 
what may become of this poor baby.” 

“ There now, hand it over, and go to your bed with the 
childer ; it ’s gettin’ down in the mouth ye are, and all for 
not eatin’ a hearty male whin ye had it to the fore,” ex- 
claimed Mary Margaret, depositing her offspring by its 
sleeping father, and reaching out her arms for the other 
child. “ There, there, go yer ways now ; just push the childer 
aisy a one side, an’ make yerself contint on half their straw 
bed on the floor, and a comfortable bed may ye find it.” 

Catharine arose to obey this hospitable command, but 
Mary Margaret called her back. 

“ See here ; is n’t it as like the holy cross now as two 
paes?” she said, putting the soft hair back from the baby’s 
temple, and revealing a crimson mark that really had a cru- 
ciform appearance, small and delicate as it was. 

“ Is n’t he born to be a saint now ! ” exclaimed the Irish 
woman, exultingly. 

“ Or a martyr, perhaps,” said Catharine ; and she walked 
sadly into the little room pointed out by her hostess. 


CHAPTER XXV. 


SEEKING FOR HELP. 


ATHARINE was content in her new home. She had 



\J been so completely worn out with suffering and excite- 
ment, that any place, which insured quiet and rest, was a 
heaven to her. 


151 


Seeking for Help. 

Besides, she found objects of interest in that humble . 
shanty that won her thoughts quietly from her own grief. 
She was so young and naturally so hopeful, that anything 
calculated to arouse affection in her nature visited it with 
soft healing. The nurse’s child awoke her heart from its 
sorrow with a strange influence, thrilling and sweet. She 
v r ould hold it fondly on her lap, smooth its silken hair with 
her fingers, kiss its soft lips, its sleepy eyes, and its plump 
little foot, with an outgush of tenderness that seemed more 
than motherly. With all her gratitude to Mary Margaret, 
she could not so caress and love her loud-voiced, hearty 
little boy. She -could not even grieve over the loss of her 
own child, with that little creature lifting its soft, wonder- 
ing eyes to her own so earnestly. 

Catharine loved to sit in the back-door of the shanty — 
with the mock orange-vine and the morning-glories framing 
her in, as if she had been one of those golden-haired Madon- 
nas that Guido loved to paint, creations that seem half air, 
half light — and caress the child, that was joy enough for 
her. 

Mary Margaret being out most of the day, Catharine was 
left to the healthful influences of these tender associations. 
She was still very pale, and her eyes were circled with 
shadows^ like those that trembled upon the wall from the 
half-open morning-glories, but she began to feel less desolate, 
and as if neither God nor man had entirely forsaken her. 

With all her gentleness and delicacy, Catharine had be- 
come precocious in many things. She had many firm and 
settled thoughts beyond her years. Suffering had done a 
holy work with that young soul, and while the dews of first 
youth were on her nature, she was rich in pure womanly 
principle. She felt that it was wrong to remain a burden 
on her poor friends. Yet when she thought of going, a 
pang smote her, and it seemed as if her young heart must 
be uprooted afresh before she could give the child up. 


152 


Seeking for Help. 


Poor, motherless girl, and childless mother ! She was not 
yet eighteen, and so delicate that it seemed as if a blast of 
air might prostrate her. 

Two weeks passed in comparative tranquillity. No one 
inquired after Catharine; and she might have been dead for 
all her former friends knew or cared about the matter. Her 
aunt believed her to be with Madame He Marke, and that 
wicked old woman neither asked, nor cared, what had be- 
fallen her. 

One morning, before Mary Margaret went out to her day’s 
work, Catharine spoke of her determination to find employ- 
ment for herself. At first, the kind woman objected, but 
her good sense directly came into action, and she saw how 
impossible it was that a creature so superior should be long 
content with a life in her humble abode. 

But what could Catharine do ? She understood a little 
of millinery and ornamental needle-work, but well she knew 
the precariousness of resources like these to a homeless 
female. One thing was certain, she must henceforth depend 
on herself. Her relatives had forsaken her. The husband 
whom she had so fatally trusted was gone, she knew not 
whither — gone, she had been told, to avoid her, and to cast 
off the responsibilities which were to burden her so fatally. 
This was the bitter drop in Catharine’s cup. This was the 
arrow that pierced her, wherever she turned. She could 
not entirely believe evil of the man she had loved, but her 
soul was troubled with a doubt more painful than certainty. 

Still, something must be done. She. could not remain 
there, a helpless burden upon the industry of others. 

Mary Margaret entered into her feelings with prompt tact. 
But what step could be taken ? With no one to recommend 
her, scarcely possessed of decent clothes to wear, without 
the power to explain the miseries of her condition, who 
would receive her? These considerations daunted even 
Mary Margaret, but at last a bright idea seized upon the 
good woman ; she began to see her way out of the difficulty. 


153 


Seeking for Help . 

“There are societies,” she said, “in New York, with 
oceans of money, just got up for the purpose of helping 
innocent crathurs when the world casts them adrift. What 
if Catharine applied to one of these societies ? The direct- 
ors were all ladies that would, of course, have feeling for 
their fellow-creatures.” Margaret had seen their names in the 
papers, and that was a crown of glory in her estimation. 

Catharine brightened with the idea. A band of benevo- 
lent women, with abundant means and gentle compassion, 
ready for poor wanderers like her. It promised to be an 
oasis in the desert of her life. In every one of those women 
she imagined an angel of mercy ready to receive and 
comfort her. 

It seemed a great blessing that so much benevolence 
could be concentrated at one point, harvesting year after 
year for the good of humanity. Yes! she would apply to 
this society ; if destitution and misery was a claim, where 
could a better right than hers be found? These angel- 
women would give her employment, they would point out 
some way of usefulness that she could pursue in peace. 

Mary Margaret gave up her day’s work, and accompanied 
Catharine to the home of benevolence. It would have done 
your heart good to hear those unsophisticated creatures con- 
gratulating each other that so much good yet existed in the 
world, and that women could be found willing to devote 
their fortunes and precious time to the helpless and the 
unfortunate. 

“Of course,” said Mary Margaret, “ they ’ll see the whole 
truth in yer innocent eyes at once, and all ye ’ll have to do 
’ill be just to hold out yer hand and take the money that 
their blissed hearts ’ill be jumpen to give. I shouldn’t 
wonder now,” continued the good woman, warming with her 
subject, “ if one of the ladies should insist on takin’ ye into 
her own house and makin’ a lady on ye entirely.” 

Catharine smiled. There was something so hopeful in 


154 Seeking for Help. 

her companion’s voice, that she could not help yielding to 
its influence, though her heart was very heavy at the 
thought of leaving the poor orphan child, who had woven 
itself so closely around her wounded affections. 

At length their walk terminated. Mary Margaret rang, 
with no abatement of confidence, at the door of a large 
house, occupied by one of the principal officers of a society 
abundantly endowed by the trusting charity of many Christian 
women — generous, noble women, who, like our two friends, 
fancied that an institution like this could only be guarded by 
angels on earth, long-suffering, self-sacrificing angels, whose 
holy mission common mortals must not dare to investigate, 
much less condemn. 

The door was opened by a woman, who received them 
with an air peculiar to those who have been inmates of our 
penitentiaries. Her manner was subdued into a sleek, un- 
natural quietness, more revolting than her original audacity 
would have been. 

“ The lady-directress was within,” she said, “ but engaged 
just then. They could sit down in the hall and wait, if they 
liked, or come again.” 

There was something about the atmosphere of the house 
that chilled Catharine to the soul, and even Mary Margaret, 
whose faith in humanity would have extracted sunbeams 
from a snow-drift, felt anxious and depressed. 

The hall was very cold, and they were chilled with the 
wind of a bleak November day. Catharine shivered beneath 
her thin shawl, and Mary Margaret insisted on folding a 
portion of her own gray cloak around her, using this as an 
excuse for a hearty embrace or two, which left the poor girl 
a little less nervous and disconsolate than she would have been. 

Once or twice a side-door opened, and some poor, want- 
stricken woman came out, and moved slowly toward the 
front door. Catharine observed that there was a look of 
angry defiance on one face, and that another was bathed 


The Professed Philanthropist. 155 

in tears. She wondered strangely at this. Why should the 
poor women go away from a place like that, angry or weep- 
ing? These thoughts made her shrink closer to Mary 
Margaret, and she longed to ask that kind creature to leave 
the place and take her home again. 

Three persons had come out from the side-door, and gone 
forth to the street with sullen, discontented faces, when our 
two friends were summoned from the hall. 


CHAPTER XXVI. 

THE PROFESSED PHILANTHROPIST. 

T HE two friends entered a parlor elaborately furnished, 
and warmed to a degree that made Catharine faint, 
coming in as she did from the cold air of the hall. A table, 
with a small desk upon it, stood before the fire, and between 
that and the cheerful blaze sat a tall and exceedingly sanc- 
timonious person, clothed in a blue merino dress, gathered 
in folds around the waist and fitting tightly at the throat. 

Catharine’s heart sunk as she met this woman’s eyes, the 
expression was so schooled — the sleek, hypocritical air was 
so transparent. She had evidently assumed the saint, till 
she absolutely believed in her own infallibility. Hollow and 
selfish to the core, she had no idea that it was not a praise- 
worthy and most holy action to sit in pampered ease from 
morning to night, and use the money provided by the truly 
benevolent as a means patronizing and wounding those who 
were compelled to submit to her unwomanly curiosity and 
sly dictation. 

This woman had subdued her thin, tallowy features into 
sanctimonious meekness so long, and had bedewed them so 
often with tears which came obedient to her wish, that she 


156 


The Professed Philanthropist. 

had obtained the look of one ready to burst into a holy fit of 
weeping, because all the world was not formed upon the 
model of her own immaculate self. Whenever an applicant 
appeared before her, a watery compassion for the wickedness, 
for which she always gave credit in advance, suffused h r 
cold eyes. Even her hair partook of the general character, 
and was smoothed back from that narrow forehead with a 
precision that nothing less than a tornado could have ruffled. 

In truth, Mrs. Brown, whom we have seen before in all her 
glory, was a finished character. The only human feeling 
to which she ever gave way was that of intense self-adula- 
tion. Even in her prayers she could not refrain from 
thanksgiving, that one perfect type of human perfection 
had still been left to a sinful world. 

This woman was an absolute studjq if poor Catharine had 
possessed the experience or the will to read her. She had 
worked so hard in thoroughly forming the character she 
had so long assumed, that it seemed to be her own. Her 
tall, precise figure, the slim, long hand, of a dead white 
and always cold, the narrow face with its dull pallor, — all 
these were greatly in her favor ; but there was one feature 
of the demure face not quite under subjection. The long 
nose harmonized with the drooping features both in form 
and color, but just at the end — as if her true nature must 
break forth somewhere — it glowed out with a fiery redness 
marvellous to behold. All the heat and color that should 
have warmed her thin lips, centred there, as if the nose had 
instituted some private experiments on the merits of the ex- 
cise law, and had resolved to keep its pleasant researches a 
secret from the other sanctimonious features. 

“ Well,” said the benevolent lady, softly, folding her hands 
over each other and back again, with solemn graciousness, 
“ well ! ” 

Catharine leaned upon the table for support. The very 
presence of this woman made her faint. Her own sensitive 


The Professed Philanthropist. 157 

nature recoiled from the hollow mockery of benevolence 
sitting in state before her. 

Mary Margaret saw how pale the poor girl became and 
ran for a chair. 

“ She is sickly, ma’am, for all them red cheeks as she had 
a minute ago, and it ’s tiresome standin’ long,” said the good 
woman, planting herself by the seat which she had thus con- 
siderately provided, with a feeling that after all the place 
was not quite a paradise. 

“ I do not object to the young person sitting down if she 
is ill,” said Mrs. Brown, with a wave of the hand, “ but if 
she is so feeble as that, I would remind you that this is not 
a hospital.” 

“ I am not ill, madam,” said Catharine, with feeling, “ but 
I am homeless and almost friendless.” 

“ Then,” said Mrs. Brown, bowing blandly, and caressing 
her hands again, “this is your proper home; that is, pro- 
viding you can be made useful to the cause, and know how 
to feel sufficient respect for the dignity of the Board.” 

“ I trust,” answered Catharine, gently, “ that I shall not 
be deficient in proper respect for anything that is in itself 
respectable.” 

“ What! ” ejaculated the lady of professional benevolence, 
sharply, while the bloom on her nose grew radiant, “per- 
haps I didn’t understand you ?” 

“ I merely intended to say, madam, that anything which 
is true and upright, never can lack respect. Even wicked 
people are forced to reverence goodness.” 

“ Very true, very true. I have often felt this when ad- 
dressed by individuals who — who claim help here. Some- 
times one is forced to bring the duty of respect before them 
in forcible language ; but it is sure to come, sometimes in 
silent homage, sometimes in tears, sometimes with sullen 
discontent ; but it ’s sure to come, before a dollar is paid out 
from the funds of this institution.” 


158 The Professed Philanthropist 

“Well,” said Mary Margaret, innocently ; “if yer lady- 
ship buys up respect by the dollar’s worth, I’m just the per- 
son that ’ll sell bushel-baskets full at a time, especially re- 
garding yer honor’s ladyship, for I’m brimming over with 
reverence for ye, from the crown of yer head to the sowl of 
yer foot, and ye’re welcome to it all ; only give this poor 
young crathur a helpen’ hand into the wide, -wide world 
again. It isn’t for the likes of her to be kept in a shanty 
like ours, anyhow.” 

Even this singular blending of irony and blarney had its 
effect upon the Lady-Bountiful, who had learned to feed her 
voracious vanity with husks as well as grain. She smiled 
sublime condescension on the buxom Irish woman, and gave 
her hands an extra twirl, stretching her neck and rustling 
her dress like a heron pluming itself. 

“ Y ou seem a very sensible woman. Such warmth of 
piety does you credit,” she said. “ It is persons like you, 
strong and healthy, ready to w T ork in return for our charity, 
and to feel the depth of the benefit conferred, that our Society 
rejoices in helping. How many children have you, my good 
woman?” 

Mary Margaret gave the number of her children, finish- 
ing with a burst of maternal eulogium on the health and 
beauty of the youngest-born. 

“ Then,” she continued, “ there is the little charity baby, 
just as good as my own, that’s got a face like an angel’s, and 
eats like a hathen. Arrah, but that ’s the boy for ye, with 
his soft, sunshiny hair, and eyes like the bluest robin’s egg; 
to say nothing of the old man, who wins mate and drink for 
us all, when there ’s work to be had.” 

“ Then you did not come for help?” 

“ Not on me own account, yer ladyship’s reverence, if I 
may call ye so on account of the beauty and holiness that ’s 
in ye. There is potaties growin’ in the bit of garden, and a 
pig at the back door, that’ll keep the hunger out yet a while ; 


The Professed Philanthropist. 159 

but this sweet young crathur, if yer reverential piety will 
just turn itself on her ! ” 

“So many children, and a husband without work! that 
is a hard case,” persisted the Lady-Bountiful brimming over 
with gratified vanity, which she solemnly believed to be an 
outburst of charity, — “ something must be done for you. 
Wait a moment.” 

The lady arose, opened a store-room adjoining her parlor, 
and after some research, drew forth a pair of heavy, woollen 
stockings, which some blessed old farmer’s wife had sent 
down to the city in a donation of old clothes, firm in the 
belief that her little mite would work out a miracle of re- 
demption somewhere among the reprobates of a great city. 

“ Here,” she said, with a look of intense benevolence, 
holding out the yarn stockings, which, by the way, were not 
mates, “ take these, and, in gratitude to the Society, make a 
good use of them. Don’t use our benevolence as an excuse 
for waste and idleness; but remember that an obligation 
like this, received unworthily, can never prove a permanent 
blessing. Take them, good woman, and while you receive 
our bounty with a just appreciation of its value, we will re- 
member you in our prayers.” 

It was beautiful to see the tears spring up, cold and heavy, 
like melting hail-stones, into those lustreless eyes, as the 
hackneyed philanthropist, overwhelmed with the magnitude 
of her own virtues, held out the huge, moth-eaten stockings 
to the astonished Irish woman. 

“ Don’t hold back ; you may accept the charity of our 
Society without fear ; beneficence is its most heavenly attri- 
bute. You see before you a proof that where the object is 
worthy, we are always ready to be liberal.” 

Mary Margaret took the stockings, tucked one under her 
arm, while she thrust her hand into the other, which came 
out at an opening in the heel, doubled-up like a sledge* 
hammer. # 


160 The Professed Philanthropist . 

Catharine, amid all her anxiety, could not prevent the 
smile, that quivered on her lips, from breaking into a low 
laugh. 

The Lady-Bountiful gave her a look of solemn indigna- 
tion, which Mary Margaret was quick to observe. 

“She’s overjoyed at my good luck, yer ladyship,” said 
the kind woman, withdrawing her hand into the foot of the 
stocking ; “ ye don’t know what a grateful crathur she is, 
always smiling like that when good comes to a friend. Now 
I dare say she was thinkin’ that a ball of yarn, and a darn- 
ing-needle, would make these the most iligant pair of stock- 
ings that an honest man can put on his feet ; and she knows, 
too, that I’m the woman that can darn as well as the queen 
herself. Now, marm, that you’ve overcome me with your 
goodness intirely, just give her a turn of your ladyship’s be- 
nevolence.” 

“ She looks sickly. Besides, I’m afraid she will prove one 
of the stiff-necked and rebellious class of persons whose in- 
gratitude has pierced the Society so often. But I will ask 
her a few questions. Will the individual tell me where she 
was born ? ” 

“Is it important that you should know?” questioned 
Catharine, in a suppressed voice. 

“ Certainly ; justice may be blind, but charity never is !” 

“ I have no reason for concealment ; but it seems an un- 
necessary question. I do not ask for money, or charity of 
any kind. I supposed that a society, established for be- 
nevolent purposes, would gladly help an honorable girl to 
obtain some means of earning her own livelihood. It is not 
charity that I ask, but help ; such as one woman may give 
to another, quietly and with a feeling of sisterhood. This 
is what I expected.” 

“ Then you refuse to answer my questions. How am I to 
know whether you are worthy or not?” 

“ If I were unworthy, would you be likely tg learn it from 


A Charitable Cross-Examination . 161 

my own lips? But I will not refuse; it may be necessary. 
I was born in the city.” 

“ What is your name? Who are your relatives? How 
came you here ? ” 

Catharine turned deathly pale and trembled. For the 
first time in her life she came near assuming her husband’s 
name. It was an act of disobedience, for, until his return, 
he had forbidden this; but she shrunk from her own name 
as if it were a disgrace ; it seemed to her that every one 
must know that she was a childless mother. She hesitated, 
her color came and went, the fear of disgrace struggled hard 
against her natural dread of assuming her husband’s name 
unauthorized. At last her resolution was taken. She 
would risk everything rather than disobey the man whom 
she had loved and trusted so entirely. He might be false 
to her, but she would still hold firm to her promise — never 
till he came back would she take his name. 


CHAPTER XXVII. 

A CHARITABLE CROSS-EXAMINATION. 

W HILE Catharine reflected, that woman’s cold eyes 
were upon her, passionless and steady as if she quietly 
enjoyed the crimson as it flushed and paled on her face. 

At last Catharine gave her maiden name, but it was in a 
low, faltering voice, and with a sharp struggle to keep the 
tears from her eyes. ^ 

“You are single, of course?” questioned the woman, sus- 
piciously eying her from head to foot. 

“ No, I have been married.” 

“ And is this your husband’s name?” 

10 


162 


A Charitable Cross-Examination. 


Catharine clasped her hands so tightly, that the blood left 
them even to the rounded nails. She looked at Mary Mar- 
garet and at her cold, hard questioner, as if she would have 
asked pity even with those eyes upon her. 

“No,” she answered, at last, “it is not his name; I have 
never borne it.” 

“Why?” 

“ We were married privately, and without his mother’s 
consent.” 

“ I thought so — I was sure of it,” exclaimed the woman, 
softly, caressing her hands again, as if they had detected 
the wrong in this young girl’s character, and she was assur- 
ing them of her approbation. “And so you were married 
privately, without his mother’s consent, and without certifi- 
cate, I dare say?” 

“ No, I had a certificate,” replied Catharine, with tears 
of shame and anger in her eyes. “ I had a certificate, but 
it is gone — lost or stolen, I suppose.” 

“ Lost or stolen — where ? ” 

“ At the hospital, when I was sick.” 

“ Oh ! ha. So you have been in the institution. I thought 
so — I thought so!” cried the woman, with cold exultation. 
“ In what ward did they place you ? ” 

Catharine d\d not shrink or tremble now. There was 
nothing in the remembrance of her maternal anguish and 
bereavement, to burn her cheek with shame, though it 
might be blanched with sorrow. She answered firmly, but 
in a low voice, — 

“ I was a wife, and they put me among those who had 
become mothers in their poverty.” 

“A wife — a mother — and no certificate — that seems 
strange; — and you even say it to me, me — a lady whose life 
has been one series of the most perfect rectitude — me, Pres- 
ident of this Board, a person who has passed through the 
very dregs of sin in her pious search after objects of charity, 


A Charitable Cross-Examination . '163 

and kept herself white as snow all the time. Are you not 
afraid that these uncontaminated boards will shrink apart 
beneath your feet, as they witness this attempt to impose on 
us?” 

Catharine had learned “ to suffer and grow strong.” Child 
as she was in all worldly things, there lay a power in her 
nature that rose to defend the innocence thus coarsely 
arraigned. She was pale, but it was a proud, calm pallor, 
which told how powerfully the blood had flowed back upon 
her heart, as an army gathers around a citadel when fiercely 
assailed. 

“ I have not attempted to impose on you, madam. Cir- 
cumstances may be against me;, still, you know in your 
innermost heart that what I have said is the truth. But 
why do you ask these questions ? Who gives you authority 
to tear out the secrets from a human soul, before you will 
extend help to a fellow-creature who only asks the means of 
earning her own bread in humble peace? What if I were 
all that you think me, a weak, betrayed, or, if you will, a 
wicked young creature — am I the less an object of charity, 
or of kindness ? Have I ceased to be a human being with 
human wants? Was it thus that our Saviour received the 
erring and the sinful ? Is it thus that our God deals with them 
here, and at this day ? Does he forbid them to earn their 
bread by honest labor, because of sins that may have been 
repented of? Does he withhold the sunshine, the rain, and the 
blossoms of the earth from their enjoyment ? I ask you again, 
would it be a just reason for withholding food and shelter 
from me, if I had done all the wrong you suspect ? ” 

The Lady-Philanthropist really seemed a little moved. 
A vague speculation came into her eyes, and the yellowish- 
white of her complexion became ashen ; but it was with rage 
at this unheard-of audacity, not with any gentle acknowl- 
edgment of the truth in that young creature's words. 

As Catharine ceased speaking, the woman of many virtues 


164« A Charitable Cross-Examination . 

folded the skirt of her dress closer about her person, as if to 
shield herself from the contagion of such sinful audacity, 
and sunk into a cold, Pharisaical attitude again. 

“ Oh,” she said, with her eyes lifted devoutly to the 
cornice, “ I sometimes wonder that these sacred walls — yes, 
I may be excused for calling them sacred, for are they not 
consecrated to charity ? — I sometimes wonder that these 
walls do not fall down and crush the audacious wickedness 
that sometimes intrudes itself here. Young person, it is not 
that you have committed this heinous wrong which offends 
me. Our society is founded in sin, and established in 
iniquity. Our mission is more particularly to the sinful, 
and from them is derived our chief glory ; but every one 
who comes here must contribute something to the cause. 
Are you willing to become an example, to confess your man- 
ifold sins, and give the particulars of your dissolute life, that 
they can be advertised in the public prints, and embodied 
in our own annual reports, setting forth the repentance 
which our kindness and prayers have wrought in you, and 
the heroism with which you published your crimes that 
others may take warning ? By this means, my dear child, 
you will not only be snatched as a brand from the burning, 
but the cause will be strengthened, and means will flow in 
to secure other cases like your own ; by this confession, our 
country friends, who have done so much ' for the regenera- 
tion of this vile city, will be satisfied that we are up and 
doing, in season and out of season.” 

The woman had arisen and taken Catharine’s hand in 
both hers, during the latter portion of this speech. The cold 
tears dropped, one by one, from her eyes, and rolled with 
sanctimonious slowness down her cheeks. 

“ What is it that you desire of me ? ” said Catharine, 
bewildered by this solemn acting. “What have I done?” 

“ What do I desire ? Why, that you confess and forsake 
your sin, but especially confess. I am ready and willing 


A Charitable Cross-Examination . 165 

to take down every word of the fearful narrative, as it falls 
from your lips. Oh ! my dear child, you have it in your 
power to aid us in accomplishing a great work — begin, dear 
child, begin ! ” 

The woman seated herself at the table, and took up a 
steel pen, sharp and hard as herself, which she dipped in an 
inkstand, shook lightly, and held ready to pounce on a 
sheet of paper, already arranged, the moment Catharine’s 
lips should unclose. 

“ Come, my poor, sweet child, don’t hesitate ; take up the 
cross and begin ; what was the first step ? ” 

“ Madam, I do not understand. What do you wish me 
to say ? I have done wrong in marrying my husband with- 
out the consent of his mother, but beyond this I have 
nothing but grief and poverty to confess ! ” 

Again the tears rolled down that woman’s face. She 
sighed heavily and shrouded her forehead with one hand. 
Then she shook her head, and looked mournfully at the two 
women, muttering something in a solemn undertone. 

At last she lifted up her head, and smiled benignly. 

“ I see. This is a case that requires time. I -will lay it 
before the Board. Doubtless the good seed has been planted 
in our conversation, to-day, and the sisters will strengthen 
my hands to reap in due season.” 

“ Then you will find the sweet crathur a place and recom- 
mend her entirely ! ” exclaimed Mary Margaret, coming to 
the point at once. 

“ We will, as I have just said, take her case into consider- 
ation,” replied the directress, blandly. “ Y ou can go home, 
good woman, for according to your light I do not doubt that 
you are good. This person can remain here ; I should prefer 
to have her directly under my own care.” 

Mary Margaret hesitated, and looked wistfully at Cath- 
arine, who returned the glance with a look of gentle submis- 
sion that went to the poor woman’s heart. 


166 


A Charitable Cross-Examination . 


“ I’ll come to-morrow, and bring both the babies with 
me, niver fear,” she said, struggling to keep back her tears ; 
“ and remember, darlint, if the worst comes to the worst, 
there’s the shanty and the childer, where ye’ll be welcome 
as the blissed sunshine every day of the year. So don’t be 
down-hearted, or put upon by that cowld-hearted lady, or 
the likes of her, any how.” 

The latter portion of this speech was delivered in a whis- 
per ; and wringing Catharine’s hand, Mary Margaret went 
out, with some new ideas of professional philanthropy that 
puzzled her honest brain not a little. A motherly old 
woman passed her in the hall. She was dressed in black 
silk and had an old-fashioned Methodist bonnet on, which 
varied but slightly from those worn by strict Quakers, and 
which are lost sight of now, save by a few old primitive 
Wesleyans, like the woman we are introducing. 

The old woman stood aside, to allow the Irish woman a 
free passage, and looked after her with a kind, genial smile, 
which almost asked if the great-hearted Christian could do 
the Irish woman any good. 

Mary Margaret understood the look and answered it at 
once. 

“ If ye could only say a kind word for the young crathur 
in yonder now,” she whispered, confidentially, “ she ’s as 
innocent as a baby, and so handy about house ; if ye could 
only take her home with yoursel’ now, it ’d be like letting 
the blissed sunshine into yer door.” 

‘‘Who is it?” questioned Mrs. Barr, — “a child?” 

“ Almost, and yet she’s been the mother of a child.” 

“ Poor thing ! ” said the old lady. 

“ You may well say that — but she’s the innocentest cra- 
thur in the wide world. So please believe everything she 
says. It’s true, every word of it.” 

The old woman looked into Mary Margaret’s eyes an 
instant, searchingly, but with kindness, and answered, — 

“ Yes, if you say it is true, I shall believe it.” 


167 


Jane Kelly on her Trial . 

“ God bless ye forever and ever for that same ! ” exclaimed 
the Irish woman warmly, and she went out, satisfied that 
she had obtained a friend for her prot6g6. 


CHAPTER XXVIII. 

JANE KELLY ON HER TRIAL. 

T HE morning on which Jane Kelly was to have her 
hearing, found Madame De Marke punctual. The 
judge, who recognized her real position, was comparatively 
deferential ; for wealth, even when allied with degradation, 
is not without power. Besides, her manner, as on the even- 
ing before, bespoke considerable knowledge of good society 
and its usages. 

Madame De Marke repeated the conversation which she 
had already stated. A lawyer, employed by her, was also 
in attendance. Jane was without professional aid. 

“The case seems clear,” said the judge, when Madame 
De Marke had closed her testimony. “ What have you to 
say? You may speak now!” he added, turning to the 
prisoner. 

The girl had frequently interrupted Madame De Marke 
until the judge had sternly ordered her, more than once, to 
keep silence; and now her suppressed rage found short and 
bitter words. 

“ She deserves the State’s prison more than I do ! ” cried 
Jane, white with passion, and looking at Madame De Marke 
as if she could have stabbed her to the heart. “ She is ten 
thousand times worse than a thief” — 

“Stick to the point,” interposed the judge. “The ques* 
tion is not, what this lady may, or may not have done ; but 
what proof there is that you did not steal the jewel.” 


168 


Jane Kelly on her Trial . 

“ Proof! Does anybody want proof that she is black- 
hearted, treacherous, lying, cowardly, a secret murderer ? ” 
raved the girl. “Yes, a murderer! She wanted me to 
commit murder, — to let a sweet young creature starve on 
her sick-bed, and tried to bribe me with that very ear-ring. 
And now she says I stole it.” 

“ Have you any proof of this ? ” 

“Proof! Proof again! What proof is there, but her 
word, that 1 took the ear-ring!” said Jane, with quick 
shrewdness, a thing she was not deficient in, when rage did 
not overmaster her entirely. “ My word ought to be as 
good as hers. She says I stole the ring, and I say she gave 
it to me ; what proof has she that her story is a bit truer 
than mine?” 

“ She swears to it.” 

“I’ll swear to mine.” 

“ That the law does not allow. An accused person cannot 
be a witness in his or her own behalf.” 

“ But the accuser may be a witness for her side.” 

“ Ho. It is the Commonwealth that prosecutes, and the 
.accuser is only a witness for the State.” 

Jane broke forth indignantly — “You dare to call this 
justice ! Such pitiful stuff you name ‘ the wisdom of the 
law ! ’ ” 

She spoke these last words with bitter scorn. “ If some 
one would come, and swear that you, the judge, had stolen, 
you ’d have to believe ’em, ha ! ha ! ” 

“ Order ! ” cried an officer, horrified. 

“ Order ! order ! ” shouted the equally horrified clerk. 

“ Ho, I’ll not come to order,” she cried, raising her voice 
to a scream of rage. “ It’s God’s truth, that I’m innocent, 
and that yonder woman tried to buy me to do murder ; and 
she ought to be here instead of me. You let her swear me 
* into prison, and won’t let me swear what a lie it is. You ’re 
in league against me, every one of you,” and she glared 


169 


Jane Kelly on her Trial. 

around on the court like a wild beast. “Justice ! You call 
this justice! The devils themselves are more just — ” 

She was proceeding in this mad way, when the police- 
officer, rushing up to her, actually dashed his hand over her 
mouth, crying, “This can’t be. Respect the court. Will 
you be silent, you jail-bird ? We’ll gag you completely if 
you don’t hush up.” 

Exhausted by her frantic rage, not less than by her strug- 
gle with the officer, Jane soon fell back, panting and ex- 
hausted, in the prisoners’ seat. When the decorum of the 
court had been restored, the case went on again ; and as the 
girl had no testimony to offer, the magistrate committed 
her, and in default of bail meantime, sent her back to the 
Tombs again. 

In due time, her case came up for trial, when the same 
testimony was repeated against her. But on this occasion, 
no such scene of disorder occurred as had marked the pre- 
liminary examination. Jane, finding how useless were her 
recriminations, had now sunk into a sullen silence. Only, 
•when asked what she had to say in her defence, she repeated 
her charge against Madame He Marke, adding, — 

“ It ’s as true as there ’s a God in heaven, whether you 
believe it or not. You take that woman’s oath, and won’t 
take mine; because she’s rich, I suppose, and I’m poor. 
She had nobody by to certify to her story any more than I 
had. I don’t wonder, with such laws, that your State’s 
prison is full.” 

The judge, however, was not convinced. He charged the 
jury that the jewel was found in her possession ; that she 
was a character well known to the police ; and that the story 
she told was inconsistent in itself. “Still,” he added, “you 
are the judges of the fact, gentlemen ; and if you disbelieve 
Madame He Marke, you must acquit.” 

The jury did not even leave the box. They had unan- 
imously come to the conclusion that the prisoner was guilty, 


170 


Jane Kelly on her Trial, 

and immediately rendered a verdict to that effect. Yet in 
after-days, more than one of them had occasion to remember 
that trial, and their share in it, with something more than 
doubt. 

J ane was sentenced to prison for the full period that the 
law allowed. Madame De Marke’s serpent-like eyes watched 
her victim closely, while the judge was pronouncing this 
severe sentence; and the momentary spasm which passed 
over the prisoner’s face was a welcome sight to her selfish 
heart. 

But neither natural inhumanity, nor revenge itself, w T ere 
the sole feelings gratified by this sentence. That night, as 
Madame De Marke sat alone, she rubbed her withered hands 
together with a chuckling laugh, and said to herself, — 

“ I have ’em safe now. The child is dead. The girl 
who got it out of the way is in the State prison ; and even 
when she gets out, her testimony won’t be received in any 
court in this country, for convicts are not competent wit- 
nesses, ha ! ha ! This Catharine,” she added, with sudden 
bitterness, “ she’s dead, no doubt, by this time. People soon 
die, in New York,” she added, with cold-blooded calculation, 
“ if they are starving and delicate. She looked like a ghost 
— had a cough — hacked away like anything.” 

The old woman rubbed her hands again with savage glee, 
and her eyes fairly emitted light in the darkness. “To 
boast she had married my son ! I ’ll teach ’em all to cross 
my path. I ’ll teach ’em. I ’ll teach ’em.” 

Mumbling this, she went about her room, preparatory to 
retiring, in order to see again that all the fastenings were 
safe. Nor was her sleep, that night, broken by remorseful 
dreams, as might have been supposed. God’s time had not 
come yet, if, indeed, it was to come in this world. 


Sheltered at Last 


171 


CHAPTER XXIX. 


SHELTERED AT LAST. 


HEN the members of the Board had all assembled, 



1 V Catharine was again subjected to the ordeal of an 
examination. This repetition of what seemed to her an 
uncalled-for curiosity was almost more than she could en- 
dure ; and if it had not been for the kind Methodist, Mrs. 
Barr, who continually interfered in her behalf, she would, 
more than once, have broken down in a passion of tears. 

“You can retire now to the adjoining room,” said the 
Lady-Philanthropist, at last. “ Meantime, we will take 
your case into consideration. But,” she added, looking 
around on her fellow-members, “ it is not clear to me, by 
any means, that you are a deserving object of our charity. 
You appear to have a thoroughly hard and ungrateful heart, 
and to want that penitence so becoming in one who has 
sinned greatly.” 

Poor Catharine ! When she found herself alone, she 
could no longer restrain herself, but sobbed out her grief 
and mortification in a passion of weeping. 

“Oh! if I could find anything to do — anywhere — no 
matter with whom,” she cried, in bitter grief, “ I would leave 
this cruel place this moment.” The poor girl took her 
hands from her eyes, and looked around, half rising as if 
about to go. “ But no ! no ! ” she said, sitting down once 
more, and burying her face again. “ I cannot be a burden 
on those poor Irish people any longer. I must stay away, 
even if I starve. I must put up with any indignity. Oh, 
George! George! how I suffer, could you but know what I 
have suffered ! ” 

The hum of voices, in the adjoining room, occasionally 
increased to almost an altercation. But Catharine, absorbed 


172 


Sheltered at Last. 


by grief, did not notice this. She remained silently weeping 
for quite half an hour, when her attention was suddenly 
aroused by a hand laid upon her shoulder. 

She looked up. It was the kind Methodist lady, who had 
interceded for her so strenuously. Catharine was ignorant 
that Mary Margaret had met this good woman in the hall, 
yet the motherly face, the plain, unpretending manner, and 
those words of benevolent intercession, had impressed the 
forlorn girl, and she knew that if she had a friend in the 
world besides the humble Irish nurse, that friend was now 
before her. The poor girl looked up, with an attempt at a 
smile, therefore ; but it was such a faint, sickly struggle, 
that her visitor’s heart ached to see it. 

“ My poor child ! ” said the old lady. 

The tears swelled into Catharine’s eyes. There was sym- 
pathy, and the promise of aid, in the very tones of this old 
Christian’s voice. It had been long since she had seen so 
kind a countenance, or heard such soothing language, ex- 
cept from the untutored Mary Margaret. 

“ My name is Mrs. Barr,” said the lady, after a pause. 
“ I am disposed to be your friend. Would you like to go 
and live with me?” 

Catharine’s face lighted up as if she were transfigured. 
Emotion made her dumb. But she grasped the hand held 
out between both her own, and covered it with grateful 
kisses. 

“ There, there,” said Mrs. Barr, with tears in her own 
eyes, “I am but a poor, human creature, and not worthy 
of such gratitude. Nor is it much I can do for you, either, 
my child. I am not blessed with a superfluity of this world’s 
goods. But what I have, you shall share, at least till we 
can look about for something better.” 

“ God will repay you, dear madam,” said Catharine, filled 
with tender thanksgiving ; “ but, oh, tell me it is all your- 
self, I cannot endure to be helped by this Society.” 


Sheltered at Last 173 

“ The Society will not have anything to do with it, ray 
child.” 

“I am so thankful.” 

Mrs. Barr shook her head. 

“ My child,” she said, “ it is natural for you to speak so, 
but I fear it is wrong nevertheless. My colleagues mean 
well ; at least I hope so,” she added, quickly ; “ but expe- 
rience has made them suspicious, for they are continually 
being deceived. Some of them, I fear, have little tact in 
reading character,” she added, soothingly, “ and judge many 
as impostors till their innocence is proved. But sometimes 
I cannot help differing with them a little. Our Saviour, 
when on earth, taught us infinite charity. I like your face, 
too. I believe you innocent.” Oh, what a look of thank- 
fulness Catharine gave her at these words ! “ So let us dis- 

miss this subject now, and forever. 

“I can’t bring the members to think as I do; for the 
lady you first saw is prejudiced against you, and has filled 
the others with her suspicions ; but,” the old lady continued, 
“ you shall not suffer. Come home with me. I have some 
sewing I want done, and when that is finished, God, per- 
haps, will find an opening for you. We will trust in him. 
Shall it be so, my dear ?” 

If there w r ere only more such people in this world, as that 
good Methodist woman, how many poor creatures, almost 
driven to despair, might be made happy. 

Catharine said this to herself, again and again, as she 
followed Mrs. Barr home. It was not an elegant residence, 
scarcely even what would be called a comfortable one, but 
it was clean, tidy, and cheerful ; Catharine felt that she had 
found a haven, at least for the present, and for the future 
she trusted in God, as good Mrs. Barr had so hopefully bade 
her do. 

“ This is the only apartment I have to give you,” said that 
lady, as she ushered Catharine into an attic, freshly white- 


174 


Sheltered at Last 


washed, with a bed of spotless snow in one corner, '* hut it 
has the advantage of having no other occupant. I have 
but one servant, who sleeps in the next attic ; she is a 
middle-aged, kind-hearted woman, who will never interfere 
with, and may often be of assistance to you. To-day shall 
be a holiday, you look worn out; so we will put off work 
till to-morrow. You may either rest here, or go to see your 
friend, whom I met in the hall ; perhaps it would relieve her 
mind to know that you are cared for, at least for a time.” 

Catharine felt as if a new world was opened to her. It 
was not only that the fear of actual starvation was past, but 
that the motherly manner of Mrs. Barr had restored faith 
and hope to her heart, both of which had been nearly ship- 
wrecked. Oh, if we could but remember, that, in bestowing 
charity, words of kind encouragement often go further than 
almsgiving. The latter only relieves present necessities, the 
former restores new energy to the fainting wayfarer on life’s 
stony highway. 

When Mrs. Barr left Catharine, the poor girl’s strength 
gave way and she sank down helplessly on the bed. She 
intended, however, to rest a little while only, half an hour 
or so, and then to set forth for Mary Margaret’s. But al- 
most immediately she sunk into a deep slumber, which lasted 
for nearly three hours ; and when this was over, she found, 
on going down stairs, that the hour for dinner had come. 
But she started, at last, for the humble dwelling of the 
Irish nurse. 

“Shure, and you look like another crathur, darlint,” 
were Mary Margaret’s words, before Catharine could speak. 
“ They did the dacent thing for yees, at last, the saints bless 
them for that same! But come in and see the childer. 
The poor baby, would ye belaive it, has pined for yees all 
day.” 

When Catharine came to tell her story in full, Mary 
Margaret broke out into an eloquent invective against the 


Madame De MarJce and her Pet. 175 

Society, but especially against the Lady-Philanthropist, 
Mrs. Brown. Catharine, however, checked her, repeating 
what Mrs. Barr had said. 

“ Well, well, darlint,” was the reply, “she’s a good woman, 
shure she is ; and may the sun always shine about her steps. 
So we’ll say nothing, for her sake, consarnin’ the others — 
the desateful, hypocritical — well, well, I’ve stopped in- 
tirely.” 


CHAPTER XXX. 

MADAME DE MARKE AND HER PET. 

M ADAME DE MARKE was alone in the miserable 
room over her own warehouse, down in the very heart 
of the city, where, at night-time, human companionship was 
almost impossible. She was assorting some fragments of 
meats and vegetables, which were heaped in a basket on her 
lap, and which she had evidently picked up from the refuse 
in the market that day. 

Nothing more repulsive can be imagined than the appear- 
ance of this degraded woman who was now given up en- 
tirely to her own grasping avarice. If she ever possessed 
the slightest traces of beauty, they had vanished long ago, 
leaving her wrinkled and brown, like old scorched parch- 
ment. But it was more the presence of moral deformity in 
her countenance, than the absence of mere physical comeli- 
ness, which rendered her so revolting. A pair of keen, 
sinister eyes, that glanced suspiciously around ; a brow on 
which craft and avarice were plainly stamped ; and a mouth 
inflexible with cruelty heightened her evil aspect, till it 
recalled that of the witch, Hecate, when she met Macbeth on 
the blasted heath. 


176 


Madame De Marke and her Pet. 


Her only companion was a cat, about as sinister-looking 
as herself, that gazed with its one greedy eye on each mouth- 
ful, as it was lifted from the basket and laid on a broken 
plate at the old woman’s feet; but hungry as the pool 
animal certainly was, she had been far too well trained to 
think of touching the food. 

As the miserly old woman proceeded in her occupation, 
she talked, now snappishly, now caressingly, to her cat, 
stooping occasionally to smooth its ragged fur with her 
witch-like hand, or warning it fiercely with her sharp, black 
eyes, whenever it seemed tempted to stretch forth its paws 
toward the plate. 

Human beings, however depraved, must have something 
to love, and when creatures of their own kind are driven 
away from them by repulsion, it often happens that the feel- 
ings, which find nothing to rest upon in humanity, turn to 
domestic animals, or anything that can give back love for 
love without the power to search or condemn. 

Thus it was that this miserable old creature loved the un- 
seemly animal, that stood so greedily turning its eye from 
the fragments of food to the haggard face looking down- 
ward with a grim smile of approval, as she saw of what 
self-control her favorite was capable. 

“Now, Peg, don’t be greedy and eat me up with your 
eye, in that way,” muttered the old creature, with a strong 
French accent, laying some cabbage-leaves and turnip-tops 
in her lap, as she continued her researches in the basket. 

“Remember, Peg, how it was you lost that other eye of 
yours. Did n’t you try to rob the chickens, and got your 
eye pecked clean out for it, Peg? and didn’t I kill that 
bantam, and give you his bones to pick? that should learn 
you good manners, Peg ! ” 

The cat winked her one eye as if she comprehended the 
thing, and her mistress went on: — 

“ There are the hens, poor, innocent dears, with their 


Madame De Marke and her Pet 


177 


heads under their wings, setting you an example, dear; — go 
take a nap, Peg, and then come back again, and you shall 
have a taste of the liver w T hen I ’ve got it in order for us.” 

The cat seemed to understand her, for with a longing look, 
first at her, then at the plate, she turned slowly and slunk 
away to a fragment of rag-carpet in a corner of the room, 
where she crouched down with her head between her paws 
and her eye half shut, ready to spring out again, should her 
mistress give signs of relenting. 

The old woman followed her movements with a sour smile. 

“That’s it,” she muttered; “for man or beast there’s no- 
thing like starvation to force obedience. Those who give 
enough of anything to satisfy them, don't know what power 

is. There is Peg, now, if she ’d had enough to eat all day, 
what would be the merit of her creeping off in that way ; 
but now I know that she’s obedient, that she fears me. 
That’s the sort of thing I like. There, there, that’ll do. 
Peg, you ’re a good old girl, there ! ” 

The cat made a spring, and seizing, with teeth and claws, 
the fragment flung to her, ran off to her corner again, fol- 
lowed by the shrill laughter of her mistress. 

“ There’s gratitude — there’s life. Now supposing you ’d 
been a fat, sleek, over-fed creature, Peg, why you ’d a been 
turning up your nose at that, and wanted chicken-bones, or 
something delicate. Oh ! hunger is a keen whetstone, is n’t 

it, Peg?” 

Peg answered by coming back, whetted to fresh eagerness 
by the morsel she had eaten, and lifting her glistening eye 
with a hungry, beseeching look, that made the old woman 
chuckle with delight. 

“ Ravenous, a’n’t you^ ” cried the old woman, -while she 
prepared to cook her supper over the handful of coals that 
glowed in a bed of white ashes on the hearth. “ Well, wait 
till I ’ve done. Learn patience from your mistress, that ’s a 
jewel ! ” 

11 


178 


Madame De MarJce and her Pet. 


Here the old creature placed a pair of iron tongs across 
the bed of coals, to answer as a gridiron, and proceeded in 
her very eccentric culinary operations, moving about the 
room with a tread that the observant cat might have envied, 
it was so stealthy. When her meal was cooked, the old 
woman placed it on the bottom of a wooden chair, and 
drawing up another, from which half the back was broken 
away, she commenced eating, with a zest that nothing but 
very sharp hunger could have given to such food. 

The old woman lingered some time over her supper, shar- 
ing the; solid half of it rather liberally with Peg, and enjoy- 
ing herself, as it seemed, to the utmost. But all at once she 
was interrupted by footsteps on the stairs, and her usual 
keen, watchful look returned. 

“Who can it be? Who can it be, Peg?” she said, anx- 
iously and almost in a whisper. “Robbers, ha ! ” 

She started up with a sharp exclamation, and pointed 
with her finger to a sash in the upper part of the door, from 
which the curtain had been partly drawn. 

“ Peg ! Peg ! ” she cried, in a voice that was sharp with 
spite, yet shook with terror, — “ Peg, it’s a man ! do you see ? 
If he breaks in, leap on him and scratch his eyes out. Do 
you hear ? tear him to pieces, Peg ! ” 

The door was slightly shaken, at which the cat arched 
her back and made ready for a spring. 

Again the door was tried, and a knock followed. 

Peg gathered herself up, and gave out a sharp hiss, which 
mingled with the shrill voice of the old woman, as the latter 
called out : 

“Who’s there? What do you want? You can’t come 
inhere. I’m a lone woman, and poor, very poor. Go away, 
I tell you ! ” 

“ Open the door, madame,” answered a man’s voice, “ open 
the door. It is your husband’s son ! ” 

“ "VYhat ? what ? Peg, do you hear that ? Hush ! ” 


The Young Man’s Return . 


179 


“ Open the door, Madame De Marke. I must speak with 
you. Surely you recognize my voice.” 

“ Yes, yes,” answered the old woman, sharply, and looking 
around the room as if she feared there might be something 
that required concealment. “Yes, in a minute. Wait while 
I find the key.” 


CHAPTER XXXI. 


THE YOUNG MAN’S RETURN. 


IRECTLY Madame De Marke unlocked the door, and 



U a tall young man of stately presence and a grave cast 
of countenance entered. He reached forth his hand, with a 
sort of painful reservation, toward the singular old creature 
whom he found there. 

“ So, it is you at last ! ” said the latter, in a soft, cajoling 
voice. “ I began to think you had forgotten your poor old 
mother.” 

“ Forgotten you ! No, no, that were impossible,” was the 
hasty reply. “But you are alone, you seem to be living 
quite alone. Where is Catharine ? ” 

“Catharine? Oh, yes, the girl. She hasn’t been here 
this year or more. A hard case that, George.” 

He started, and looked at her sternly. 

“What do you mean, madame?” he said. “ Where, I say, 
where is Catharine ? I left her with you ! I demand her 
of you again.” 

“You left her with me, of course you did. Wasn’t she 
my own help, bound to me till she was eighteen by the city 
authorities ? Of course you left her here, why not ? ” 

The young man grew pale, and his eyes darkened with in- 
tense anxiety ; but he restrained his impetuous feelings, and 
spoke in a voice so low, that it was almost a whisper. 


180 


The Young Man’s Return. 

“ Tell me, I entreat,' madame, where is this girl now? ” 

“ How should I know ? She ran away after you sailed.” 

“ Ran away ? where ? Where ? ” 

“You needn’t ask me. How should I know? What 
carries a wild girl into the streets?” 

“ The streets ! ” cried the young man, in a husky whisper. 
“ The streets ! ” 

“I believe,” said the old woman, unfeelingly, “she brought 
up at the prison or Almshouse, at last.” 

“ Prison ! Almshouse ! Madame, woman, how dare you 
confess that she was so far deserted, the poor, poor girl. 
Was she ill? Was she wronged ? Tell me why this desti- 
tution fell upon her ! ” 

The old woman fixed her keen eyes on the excited and 
stern face of the young man, with a hard, determined look 
that made the heart tremble in his bosom ; and he shrunk 
back with mortal dread, as if a rattlesnake were about to 
spring upon him. 

“ She had disgraced my house, sir, and I sent her out of it.” 

The young man started back, and turned white to the very 
lips. 

“ JSTot, not! — woman, tell me what this means ! ” 

The woman was ruthless. The glitter grew sharper and 
keener in her eyes. She had no compassion on the terrible 
agitation that shook the young man. 

“ Go up to the Almshouse, if you want to know more. 
She may be there yet with her child ! ” 

“ With her child, her child ? my wife, my poor, poor wife ! 
I tell you, woman, she was my wife. Before God and man, 
she is my wife — mine, mine — do you hear?” 

“ Yes, I hear ; she said the same thing. I did n’t believe 
her. I don’t believe you. It is the old crazy blood up. 
You would cover her shame with your own. Like father, 
like son.” 

“ Woman, you insult me, you wrong that dear girl!” cried 


The Young Man’s Return. 


181 


tlie young man, trembling with passion, “I repeat again^ 
she was my wife ! ” 

“ Perhaps you can give me the proof? ” said the old woman, 
holding out her hand, while a quiet sneer stole across her 
lips. “ She had nothing to show — you may be better off! ” 

“ Catharine has the proofs. I left them with her.” 

The old woman laughed, or rather hissed otit her satisfaction. 

“ She was a careless thing to lose them, I must say that. 
All I asked was some written proof of her story. If she 
had a certificate, why not show it ? I would n’t have let 
her go to the Almshouse, if she had ! ” 

The old woman seemed to love the repetition of this hate- 
ful word, the Almshouse, for she saw that it made the young 
man wince ; and this was a joy to her. 

The poor youth made no reply, but sat dowh, faint with 
suffering ; for now he began to comprehend the utter misery 
of his position. Months had passed since his poor young 
wife could have known the shelter of a respectable home. 
What might she not have endured, so young, so helpless, a 
mere child in years ! How terribly she must have suffered. 
The cruelty of his miserable old stepmother was lost in the 
rush of remorseful compassion that filled his soul. With 
all this flood of sorrow came a new birth of feeling, so strong, 
so intense, that it thrilled him from head to foot. He scarcely 
recognized it as a joy, it was so strange, burning like a drop 
of elixir through all the pain and disappointment that had 
fallen upon him. 

He was a father ! A living soul had started from the 
immortal life within him ; and the thought swept like solemn 
music through his stormy passions, giving dignity and depth 
to his manner. 

He turned from the old woman with new-born gentleness. 
His white lips quivered with tender emotion, his eyes grew 
dark and misty, he forgot that the creature before him had 
trampled all that he loved in the dust. Thoughts of his 


182 


The Young Man’s Return . 

wife and child filled his whole being. He turned away, and 
was passing through the door, when Madame De Marke 
addressed him. 

“Where are you going ? ’’ she said. 

“ In search of my wife and child ! ” 

The last word thrilled through and through his whole 
being. His face, that had been pale till now, flushed to the 
temples, and a smile of ineffable sweetness broke oyer his 
lips, as the word, “My child,” left them. He even looked 
at the wicked old woman as if demanding sympathy for his 
new joy from her. 

“ If they are upon earth, I shall find them,” he said, “ by 
to-morrow, at the furthest, I shall find them.” 

“ And what will you do with them when they are found? ” 
demanded the old woman, maliciously. 

“What will I do?” said the youth, “what will I do? 
Why, give up my strong manhood to their support ; for 1 am 
strong now.” 

And so he was. Youth and hope and earnest feeling 
gave to his nature the energy of middle age. 

He went down those flights of winding stairs, with every 
nerve of his body awake to the joy singing at his heart. 
What cared he that his child was born in an Almshouse? 
Was it not his child, was not Catharine alive? Was he not 
young, and strong to work, to suffer, to be her protector, 
body and soul forever ? For he could imagine no time when 
his love for the sweet girl would cease to be immortal. 

What cared he, that, by his father’s will, Madame De Marke 
had power to withhold his inheritance for a time ? Let her 
have it. The West was broad and land plenty; a log house 
among the prairies, with Catharine and her child, would be 
heaven enough for him. While these hopeful thoughts 
floated through his brain, the old woman listened to his light 
footsteps, grasping the door with one hand, while her witch- 
like face peered through into the dark passage. When his 


183 


The Young Man’s Return . 

footsteps died away, she drew back, and closed herself in, 
with a low chuckle. 

She sat down, dropping one hand on her lap with a quick- 
ness that impressed the cat as a signal ; and leaping upon the 
old woman’s knee, the animal sat there, gazing into the evil 
brightness of her eyes with a look of kindred intelligence. 

The woman smoothed the ragged back of her favorite 
with one hand, while a grin of satisfaction disturbed her 
mouth. 

“ I hope he will find ’em, Peg, don’t you ? ” 

The cat crept upward, and laid her paws on the old 
woman’s shoulder ; then with a leap that made her mistress 
give forth a cowardly scream, she sprang over, and seizing 
a poor little mouse that was attempting to escape under the 
door, began to torture it with her paws. 

Madame De Marke sat up half an hour later than usual 
that night, watching the cat as she prolonged her malicious 
enjoyment, looking away from its trembling victim now and 
then as if to claim her sympathy. 

“That’ll do! that’ll do, Peg!” said the old woman at 
last, waving her hand as if to command an execution ; “I’m 
getting sleepy, Peg, kill the thing.” 

The cat turned her head, holding down the victim with 
one claw. 

“ Don’t you hear, Peg ? ” said the old woman, starting up, 
“ kill it, I say ! ” 

The cat made a quick movement, and away darted the 
mouse through a crevice between the door and the threshold. 
The old woman laughed with great glee, while Peg slunk 
away under the bed, looking very much ashamed of her 
bungling; but when the tallow candle was put out, and 
Madame safe in bed, she ventured to creep out and coil her- 
self up over the old woman’s feet ; and with this companion- 
ship alone was Madame de Marke left, hot only that night, 
but for months after. 


184 


Searching for his Wife, 

K 

CHAPTER XXXII. 


SEARCHING FOR HIS WIFE. 


EORGE DE MARKE walked the streets of New 



VX York all that night. Long before daybreak he wasj 
hovering around the walls of Bellevue, working off his 
impatience by abrupt turns among the neighboring streets, 
or standing upon the wharf with his face to the east, watch- 
ing for the first quiver of daylight upon the waters of the 
river. 

It was strange, but no misgiving seemed to reach him 
during that long watch ; and he looked upon the gloomy 
walls of the hospital with a feeling of profound interest ; for 
they had sheltered his wife and child, and anything seemed 
less degrading to the young man than the miserable home 
of his stepmother. At last the day gave its first faint glow 
along the horizon, shedding a pale brilliancy down upon the 
water, and revealing the Long Island shore in faint glimpses, 
half of mist, half of light. Then came a soft, rosy bloom, 
breaking through the mist, and trembling down upon the 
water as if a shower of rose-leaves had fallen upon the 
river during the night-watches. 

All this seemed very beautiful to the young man, and 
each new ray of light came to his soul like a promise. It 
was not till the soft pink tints were all washed away with a 
deluge of gold from the rising sun, that the youth turned 
from the wharf and sought admission to the hospital. 

The attempt was fruitless. Not till deep in the morning 
could he gain admission within the walls ; so he plunged 
into the city again, and wandered as before, at random, filled 
with but one thought, and hungry — not for food, but for 
knowledge of the only objects dear to him on earth. 

Late in the day, he found admission to the hospital. 


185 


Searching for his Wife. 

Catharine was not there. He could learn nothing of her or 
her child, and now stood by a clerk’s desk, waiting with 
faint heart for the tidings the dumb pages of the register 
might give him. 

“ Catharine, Catharine De Marke,” muttered the clerk, 
and running his finger down the column of names, “ I find 
no such name here. There are plenty of Catharines, but no 
De Markes. You must be mistaken, sir, — the register 
never is.” 

The young man bent his forehead to his hand, with a 
faint groan, while the clerk closed the huge register with a 
clang, and was about to move away. 

“ It may be,” said De Marke, suddenly lifting his head, 
“ it may be that she gave another name. Poor child ! I had 
never given her leave to take mine. Look again. It may 
have been registered Catharine Lacy. I am sorry to trouble 
you, but do search once more. She was my wife, but might 
not have dared to use my name.” 

The clerk opened the huge book again, and commenced 
running down its pages with his finger, with a rapidity 
that exhibited some feeling for the unhappy man, who stood 
watching him with such intense anxiety. At last he paused, 
cast a quick glance at his visitor, and slowly wheeled the 
book toward him. 

The young man bent down, and saw the writing through 
a faint mist that turned to a burning haze as he read, — - 

“ Catharine Lacy entered — died and buried with her child, 
April ” 

The color left his face and lips. He threw his arms out 
as if to protect himself from falling, and sunk on a bench 
that stood by, without a word or a groan. Everything was 
dark around him. He had no wife — he was no longer a 
father. The secret of his marriage, so long buried in his 
heart, had perished in a single instant. Nothing was left but 
a remorseful memory, which must lie there, the dust Qf a 
dead love, forever and ever. 


186 


Searching for his Wife. 

• 

He did not speak a word, but got up and staggered away, 
weak with the misery that had fallen upon him. 

On the third day from this, George de Marke stood once 
more in the miserable den which his stepmother inhabited. 
Sternly, and with steady repulsion of manner, he addressed 
the old woman : 

“ Give me,” he said, “ a portion of my father’s property, 
let it be ever so small, that I may leave this place forever.” 

“ There is nothing for you, not a cent,” replied the old 
woman. “ You have not reached the age when you can 
command a sous of my money. That was your father’s 
will. When you bring me a legal son, and are of proper 
age, it will be time for a settlement.” 

“ But you wrote me, if I would take this unfortunate voy- 
age to the Indies, that a portion of the wealth should be 
mine at once. For her sake I went. It was like giving up 
life, but I went resolutely, even though she did not reply to 
the letter which prepared her for my absence.” 

“ She never got the letter, of course not. I did not believe 
all the stuff about a marriage, and I don’t now,” answered 
the old woman, insolently. “ Your letter went to kindle my 
fire. Five good sheets of paper wasted. If it had only been 
for this extravagance, you ought to have been disinherited. 
But where is the girl ? What has become of her baby ? If 
you are married, bring out the creatures and the documents. 
If the child is a boy, you have only a few years to wait be- 
fore there ’ll be something to feed him on. Where is the 
wife and heir ? ” 

The young man arose, without a word, and in this stern 
silence left the room. 

It was many years before the two met again. 


Turning Shadows into Sunbeams. 


187 


CHAPTER XXXIII. 


TURNING SHADOWS INTO SUNBEAMS. 

HERE was Catharine Lacy all this time ? Away in 



H a New-England village, where a merciful institution 
had been established for the care and amelioration of in- 
sanity. Mrs. Barr had become matron of the house, and 
she took Catharine with her as an assistant, having learned 
to know and love the girl as good people are sure to love 
the excellence they have benefited. 

The building w T as of recent erection ; the grounds were 
newly laid out, and were, of course, somewhat bare of orna- 
ment. But a few grand old forest-trees had been left scat- 
tered over them in clumps and singly, while an undergrowth 
of ferns, wild shrubbery and thick rich grass compensated 
for all lack of scientific culture. Beyond all that, the situa- 
tion was a commanding one. The prospect from almost 
every window was beautiful. Hillsides covered with thrifty 
crops — maple groves that became gorgeous in the autumn 
— farm-house3 that gave an idea of elegance as well as com- 
fort, formed lovely rural pictures whereon the inmates of the 
institution looked. Indeed, within or without, there was 
nothing to excite the brain or give an unpleasant emotion. 
Authority there was, certainly, firm and judicious, but so 
concealed in all its rugged points, that even the sharp sus- 
picion of insanity failed to jar against it. Indeed, the ruling 
spirit of this place was Mrs. Barr, whose charity was ever 
prevailing, and whose firm goodness was rendered efficient 
by proportionate strength. To her the inmates of this 
building were objects of unlimited interest. She gave up 
all the energies of her life for their benefit, and learned to 
find in each diseased mind some sane spot capable of un- 
derstanding the sympathy she gave. 


188 Turning Shadows into Sunbeams. 

What Mrs. Barr was to her charge, Catharine became in 
another way. Notwithstanding her hard life, she was not 
uneducated : no girl of good natural ability ever need be 
ignorant in this land. So long as she can read and write, 
the keys of all knowledge are in her own keeping ; nature 
supplies objects of beauty upon which her imagination can 
feast, and books are so plentiful, that she can hardly escape 
the information they contain. 

In her childhood, Catharine had received generous advan- 
tages and secured the idea of many accomplishments which 
application was sure to improve ; these she brought into ac- 
tion at once. A love of music placed her in quick sympathy 
with many of the patients. Her talent for painting, crude 
as it was, supplied amusement for others. She had a fine 
voice, and was that rare being, a natural reader. The very 
tones of her voice filled the listening ear with harmonies. 
With this exception, Catharine’s attainments were few; 
but natural talent — not to say genius — gave grace and 
piquancy to them all. Besides, she was so pretty, so ex- 
quisitely truthful, that even insanity felt the charm of her 
whole character. 

Mrs. Barr had left the girl to her own gentle devices. 
A perfect knowledge of her character made this course a 
wise one. When God gives the power of usefulness to any 
human being, that power teaches the way. So this young 
creature was let loose into the establishment as a wild bird 
is free to the woods, and worked out her own sweet will un- 
checked. On first coming to the institution, a> conversation 
regarding the future had taken place between Catharine 
and her benefactress. There was nothing in her history 
which she had not revealed to this good woman, except the 
name of her husband and of her aunt. These she kept a 
secret in her own bosom, and Mrs. Barr trusted her suffi- 
ciently to respect a reserve which injured no one. 

This conversation arose one day, when Catharine was called 
upon to sign her name. 


Turning Shadows into Sunbeams. 189 

“ It is not my name,” she said, doubtfully, “and I think it 
would annoy my aunt to see it connected with any public 
institution, but his name I am forbidden to use.” 

Mrs. Barr took the pen from Catharine’s hand, walked 
to a window, and became very thoughtful for some time. 
She was a widow with sufficient means for an humble in- 
dependent support. They had been ample once ; but she 
had given them with a free hand year after year, till but 
little was left. Her life had been full of benevolence, but 
she was very lonely, notwithstanding. What if she adopted 
this young person! The thought became more and more 
pleasant. She, who had been all her life childless, might 
gain the benefits and happiness of motherhood by uniting 
this young creature’s destiny with her own. She went back 
to the table where Catharine was sitting, and placed the pen 
in her hand. 

“ Sign it Catharine Barr, if you like the name and will 
take me for a mother,” she said, “ for, henceforth, I consider 
you as my own child. There is no ene on earth to question 
my right, and it will be a relief to these proud friends of 
yours.” 

Catharine threw her arms around the old woman’s neck, 
and kissed her soft cheek in grateful silence. Then she took 
up the pen again, and wrote Catharine Barr plainly as she 
could through the tears that were filling her eyes. So from 
that day Catharine knew what it was to have a firm friend, 
and a tender mother, and in this way her identity was lost 
alike to those who had sought her so anxiously and to those 
who gladly forgot her. 


190 


j Elsie, the Lunatic . 


V 


CHAPTER XXXIV. 

ELSIE, THE LUNATIC. 

rpiHERE was one person in that institution to whom Cath- 
X arine warmly attached herself at first sight. She was 
a middle-aged woman, possessed of a wild sort of beauty, 
which might have been loveliness in youth, and was now 
wonderfully picturesque. She had been a long time insane; 
sometimes in a madhouse, violent and refractory ; sometimes 
in private institutions, always especially cared for, as the 
rich provide for their unfortunates ; but never, until now, 
surrounded with home-like elegances, and attentions so 
delicate, that they did not seem to be watchful. 

This woman occupied a little parlor and bedroom close 
to that in which Catharine slept. She was under no visible 
restraint, for the inmates only recognized their keepers as 
servants, and felt complimented by their devoted attention. 
One day, in passing Catharine’s door, she saw her bending 
over the table, toiling patiently over a drawing, which she 
was forced to work out, with no help save that of her own 
genius. Something, either in her attitude or countenance, 
arrested the woman, who turned, and, after peering into the 
room to make sure that no one else was there, stole in so 
noiselessly that Catharine was unconscious of her presence, 
until she felt her breath floating across her cheek. 

“ Get up, that ’s all wrong.” 

Catharine started from her chair in some alarm. The 
woman sat down, seized upon a pencil, and went to work 
with the spirit and dash of an artist. That which Catha- 
rine had been striving to accomplish, she achieved with a 
few movements of the hand, creating a perspective here, a 
middle distance there, and livening up the foreground with 
a figure or two that fairly startled the girl, as she saw them 
grow into a vraisemblance of humanity under her gaze. 


Elsie, the Lunatic . 


191 


All at once, the woman looked up, and Catharine re- 
marked the wonderful beauty of her eyes, now widening 
with pleasure. 

“He stood exactly so, that night,” she said, “touching 
one of the figures with her pencil. I —no, I ’m not here. 
It is that terrible woman. How dare you let her come near 
him?” 

She seized the paper between her hands, tore it fiercely 
through the middle, and flung it down, quivering, as if she 
had just dashed a serpent from her. When Catharine 
stooped to pick up the fragments, her excitement grew in- 
tense ; she stamped her foot down upon the paper, defied 
the girl with her great burning eyes, and dashed out of the 
room. 

At first this scene frightened Catharine, but in the end it 
gave her a hopeful idea. This woman had the knowledge 
which she was toiling for. Might it not be guided for their 
mutual benefit ? She consulted with Mrs. Barr, and resolved 
to lure the maniac into an occupation which might bring 
her dormant faculties into healthy action. 

The next day, she went to Elsie’s room, with a variety of 
many-colored silks in her hand. The woman was sitting by 
herself, silent and sullen. She had some loose beads in her 
lap, and was counting them over one by one, dropping each 
with a click into the pile, and evidently wondering why it 
never grew less. She caught a glance at the silks in Cath- 
arine’s hand, stirred restlessly in her chair, and fell to count- 
ing her beads again. Catharine sat down by the window, 
spreading out her silks in a connection which would have 
disturbed any one who had an artist’s eye for color. Elsie 
watched her keenly, dropping her beads all the time; but 
Catharine could see that the heavy mournfulness of her eyes 
kindled into intelligence, and that she was growing restless. 
Still, the little temptress went on matching her colors bung- 
lingly. 


192 


Elsie, the Lunatic. 


All at once, the crazy woman started up, her hoard of 
beads fell to the floor, and rushed, helter-skelter, over the 
room. She did not heed them in the least, but set herself 
dow T n on the carpet, at Catharine’s feet, and taking the silks 
from her hands, began to arrange them in such contrast, or 
harmony, as her fancy dictated. It was a study to watch 
this poor demented creature, as she pursued her work, lov- 
ingly as a child dresses her doll. She looked up more than 
once, and laughed pleasantly. Catharine smiled back, for 
she knew that in this she was resurrecting an almost dead 
faculty. 

By what link of intelligence the maniac and her young 
nurse became in accord, I cannot determine, but it was not 
long before Elsie learned to smile when she appeared, end 
was docile as a lamb in her company. Almost, it wouid 
seem, by a miracle, she brought the long-buried talents of 
former years into action. True, Elsie was erratic, and she 
would only exert herself when the caprice was on her, but 
Catharine had the good sense to leave her free, and thus won 
a world of instruction from her, giving and taking benefit. 

Perhaps this was the most tranquil period of Catharine’s 
life. It certainly was the most useful, and God has so or- 
dained it that no human soul can devote its energies to the 
good of humanity without proportionate self-benefit. In 
truth, it is only through others that we are ever made 
happy. Selfishness has no power of radiation, and degener- 
ates the soul it centres in. The great secret of human happi- 
ness lies in that benevolence which encompasses the greatest 
number of God’s creatures with benefits. 

Was Catharine happy? No, a famished heart is never 
content. In all her duties, one thought was forever upper- 
most, and even in her sleep she was haunted by two images : 
the husband who had abandoned her, and the child that 
had for a little time taken the place of her own. Was she 
never on earth to hear of them again? More than two 


Showing how a Good Woman can Die. 193 


years had gone by ; what had the authorities done with the 
child? Was he among the pauper children? Was he dead, 
or had some person taken compassion on his helplessness ? 
She had no way of learning. Mary Margaret, with all her 
goodness, did not know how to write, and the last time Cath- 
arine had looked for the humble roof that sheltered her in 
the hour of need, a brown-stone house was approaching com- 
pletion upon the ground where it had stood ; the rocks upon 
which the goat had browsed were blasted away, and no vestige 
of the pond remained. 

More than once, Catharine had written to Madame De 
Marke, imploring news of her husband. Not a word came 
in reply, but, spite of all this, a vague faith in him still 
lived in her heart. 

Thus time wore on, not heavily, as he creeps with those who 
have no duties to perform, but surely leaving traces of his 
progress, either for good or for evil, on every living thing. 
To Catharine he had given health, intelligence, a rich growth 
of mind, and such beauty as her early years had never 
promised. Her slender girlishness had rounded into perfect 
-proportion, not the less delicate because it had ceased to be 
fragile. Her face had gained bloom and expression. Timid 
hesitation of manner had given way to a calm self-compo- 
sure, modest as it was dignified. Such was Catharine as she 
entered into her real womanhood. 


CHAPTER XXXV. 


SHOWING HOW A GOOD WOMAN CAN DIE. 

ATHARINE did not observe it at first, but Mrs. Barr 



had been failing for more than a year. A life of con- 
stant exertion began to tell upon her, and she was. at last 
clearly admonished that her days of usefulness were draw- 


194 Showing how a Good Woman can Die . 

ing to a close. She said little about this* until increasing 
weakness forced her to relinquish some of her duties ; not 
that the subject troubled her, but her noble heart shrunk 
from giving the pain which the mournful truth must inflict 
. on her best friend and almost daughter. ^ 

One night there was a dance in the dining-room of the 
Asylum ; for it was a part of Mrs. Barr’s new system, that 
amusements of all kinds, which could inspire wholesome 
pleasure, were the best means of restoration in almost every 
case of insanity. It was understood that all the usual pre- 
parations for a ball were to be insisted upon, and no set of 
school-children ever exhibited more interest in an exhibition, 
than these unfortunates took in their toilets. 

Elsie was unusually excited ; a dozen times that day she 
swept through the halls in search of Catharine, first in one 
dress, then in another, each more fantastic than the rest, yet 
all arranged with artistic effect, as if she had been intending 
to sit for a portrait. Other inmates were on the alert, and it 
was wonderful to see how much of absolute reason mingled 
with their fantasies. One young creature, fancying that she 
was Queen Elizabeth and about to hold court, was in great trib- 
ulation, because her crown had been torn to pieces and the jew- 
els lost. Another, who fancied herself Charlotte Corday, took 
Catharine on one side, to consult with her about the possi- 
bility of washing the blood from her hands. There was no 
end to their perplexities or various ways of expressing them. 

One poor creature, who fancied that she had killed her 
husband, insisted on wearing a mask, that the officers might 
not discover her. But the greater number, being monoma- 
niacs upon some given point, understood the nature of the 
amusement offered them, and acted with great decorum, 
enjoying the fantasies of their companions as a sane person 
might. 

Catharine was very busy that day. Mrs. Barr had ad- 
mitted for the first time that she w T as not quite well enough 


Showing how a Good Woman can Die. 195 

to help, and this imposed a host of duties on her assistant. 
The dancing-room was to be decorated with garlands, on 
which the inmates worked with enthusiasm. Supper was to 
be prepared — in fact, Catharine required all the adminis- 
trative talent she possessed to carry the affair through with 
credit. It was a first experiment of the kind ; and in the 
absence of Mrs. Barr she felt the responsibility even to ner- 
vousness. 

At nightfall the inmates of the house began to assemble ; 
they all seemed to understand that perfectly good behavior 
was expected of them ; and their efforts at superior and extra 
politeness were touching, and at times ludicrous. 

Thera was no regular music, but Catharine had become a 
fair performer, and she at once placed herself at the piano ; 
and, trusting to her ear, dashed into the most exhilarating 
music she was capable of. 

Directly, a singular and most picturesque scene presented 
itself. Each inmate had satisfied his or her own fancy in the 
way of costume, and in some cases the effect was richly fan- 
ciful. Among the rest, Elsie came in dressed after a fashion 
that had prevailed twenty years before; even in her insanity 
the exquisite taste for which she had been remarkable in 
her youth manifested itself. She might have stepped out of 
some old family picture — the costume was so perfect both 
in arrangement and coloring. 

Catharine, happy in the enjoyment of those around her, 
was playing with unusual spirit, when Elsie came into the 
room. She stood awhile by the door watching the dancers ; 
then, as if something displeased her in the music, she crossed 
over to the piano, touched Catharine on the shoulder, and 
made a motion that she should get up from the music-stool. 

Catharine obeyed, and Elsie, sweeping out her skirts with 
a queenly gesture, seated herself, and dashed into an old- 
fashioned dancing-tune that made the room ring again. At 
first, her touch was a little heavy and stiff, but after a while 


196 


Showing hoiv a Good Woman can Die . 

those slender fingers flashed across the keys like lightning. 
The usually sad face became brilliant, and, with a bend of 
the head that a queen might have envied, that demented 
woman brought another beautiful talent out of the past, 
proudly as a child exhibits its most gorgeous plaything. 

Catharine was very tired, and went away from her weary 
work at the piano with a sensation of relief that no one 
could have guessed at from the expression of her sweet face. 
She stood a moment at the door, looking at the bright scene 
her own energies had wrought out of the most unpromising 
materials that ever presented themselves to human talent. 
There, under the lights and the flower garlands, she saw 
those helpless creatures, full of childish gleefulness, dancing, 
smiling, and filling the room with laughter, genuine as could 
be heard in any saloon of the large cities. 

The sight was a pleasant one, and Catharine turned away 
from it wondering that she should feel so sad. She went 
slowly up to Mrs. Barr’s room. The good lady had not felt 
well enough to come down, and she would sit by her a while 
and warm her heart with a description of the scene she had 
just left. 

Mrs. Barr was sitting alone, with her hands clasped softly 
in her lap. There was no lamp in the chamber, but the 
light of a calm summer’s moon fell upon her face, touching 
the middle-aged features with serene beauty. 

Catharine drew a foot-stool close to her friend, and sat 
down upon it. * 

“How still you are,” she said, gently. “ It seems like a 
sabbath here, after all the hilarity down-stairs.” 

“ Are they happy ? Does our little plan succeed, Catha- 
rine?” 

“Yes, madam. You never saw children let out an hour 
before school-time enjoy themselves more.” 

“Poor things; how one learns to love their helplessness. 
I should almost like to stay with them a little longer.” 


Showing how a Good Woman can Die. 197 

“A little longer?” faltered Catharine, touching the 
clasped hands in Mrs. Barr’s lap with a sort of awe, as if 
she expected to find them growing cold. 

“Yes, my child, but it cannot be. God chooses his own 
time, and chooses it well. Do not start and look at me so 
mournfully, Catharine. It is a short journey I am taking • 
one which every soul must travel.” 

“ But you are not sure ; only a little while ago you seemed 
so well,” pleaded Catharine, with tears in her voice. 

“ Still, I am near the end ; the moon is at its full now — ” 
She paused, and looked kindly down into the sad young face 
uplifted so piteously to hers. This broken sentence had 
chilled it into paleness. 

“You — you do not mean that?” she questioned. “Oh, 
not so soon ! ” 

Mrs. Barr unlocked her hands, and laid one of them on 
the anxious creature’s head, tenderly as if she had been 
smoothing the white plumage of a dove. 

“ Very soon ; it may be to-night; I feel it creeping toward 
me.” 

Catharine uttered a broken cry, and dropping her head, 
whispered a prayer for strength. 

“Or any hour — the doctor thinks it will be sudden; I 
know it will be soon.” 

“ Oh, my friend ! my dear, dear friend, what shall I do 
without you ! ” 

“ The God who calls me will comfort you, my child.” 

There was something ineffably calm and sweet in the dying 
woman’s voice, but it was very faint. 

“ Do you suffer ? ” questioned Catharine. 

“ A little, but that is nothing ; I want to talk to you, my 
good child, not of myself — all is right with me, but what 
will the world have for you when I am gone ? ” 

“ Nothing.” 

When that one pathetic word fell from Catharine’s lips, 


198 Showing how a Good Woman can Die . 

she covered her face with both hands, and began to cry, not 
noisily, but with a hush of grief all the more touching from 
its stillness. 

“You must go away, Catharine.” 

“Yes, my friend,” answered Catharine, meekly ; “tell me 
what I must do in your sweet wisdom ; God will guide me 
to follow it.” 

“ There will be new people coming. Y ou are young and 
very, very pretty, my child ; too young, and far too beautiful 
for a place like this. Some way will be opened, take it. 
Seek quietness and protection. Some day your husband will 
come back.” 

“ Oh, say that again, Mother Barr — once more ; from 
those dear lips it seems like a holy promise.” 

“ It is a holy promise, or God would not have sent it so 
clearly to my mind at the last.” 

“ I will believe it — I do believe it. Oh, if you could only 
live to know.” 

“ I shall know, child.” 

Catharine kissed the hand which had fallen away from 
her head. She did not comprehend the faith in these last 
gentle words ; but Mrs. Barr went on, smiling wanly upon her 
through the moonlight. 

“ Oh yes, dear ; I shall know ; that will be a part of my 
blessedness. But now, while we are here and so still, let me 
tell you what I have done.” 

“ No, no ; do not tell me ! it makes this so real,” pleaded 
Catharine. 

“ My poor child, it is real.” 

“ Oh, let me hope not, a little longer — only a little longer.” 

“There is a paper in my desk — a will. It is not much, 
but all I have is yours.” 

Catharine began to sob. 

“ Hush, child, hush ! You are my daughter, sent when I 
needed one most. You have been a good, good child. I 


199 


Showing how a Good Woman can Die. 

love nothing so dear on earth. It is little, but enough to 
keep you from taking wages of any one. For all that, dar- 
ling, you must be useful. God made all his creatures for 
usefulness. Human suffering will want alleviation. You 
will find duties at every step. Do them well — ” 

The good woman paused a moment, struggling for breath. 
This conversation was exhausting her feeble strength. After 
a little, she spoke again : 

“Keep my name, Catharine, till your husband comes 
back and gives you his own. It pleases me to think that it 
does not quite die out with me. Now go down, darling. 
The good people will want you, and I would like to rest a 
little.” 

Catharine arose with a heavy heart, and w T ent down- 
stairs. The inmates of the dancing-room were all in gay 
commotion. Elsie was at the piano, inspired with her own 
music. They did not need Catharine, so she went up to her 
own room, and, kneeling by the bed, wept and prayed for 
that dear life with passionate earnestness. Never until now 
had she known how clear and good this woman had been to 
her ; how nobly she had influenced a life threatened from the 
first with disaster. She felt in all her being a dread of the 
loneliness which would fall upon her when that gentle guide 
and wise counsellor was gone. It was difficult to force the 
cruel belief of her immediate danger on her mind. The ca- 
lamity was more than her recoiling thoughts could grasp. 
By degrees, a faint hope broke up through her prayers, and 
instead of pleading, she fell into a sad reverie. It was a heart- 
disease ; this she knew well ; but the peculiar form — what 
young girl could be expected to understand that ? Sometimes 
such maladies are slow, painful, and full of anguish. Again, 
they only give a faint indication of the death which is surely 
coming, and when it does come, strikes its victim down in 
an instant. This was the insidious disease which had blinded 
the poor girl to its progress till the end was upon her. She 


200 Showing how a Good Woman can Die. 

could not believe in its reality. Now that she was alone, 
hope would spring up in her heart ; she thought of that 
sweet old face, the low, calm voice, and it seemed to her 
impossible that death could be so near. Gradually her 
prayer, which had at first been a passionate entreaty for an 
existence so precious, took almost a glow of thankfulness. 
It seemed as if that dear life must be prolonged ; as if the 
very agony of her own prayers must win a beneficent an- 
swer from God. 

Almost tranquillized by this faith, the weary young crea- 
ture dropped her head upon her folded arms, and a feeling 
of drowsy languor came upon her — not sleep, but rest. All 
. at once she was aroused by a shock of the whole frame, so 
strong and sudden, that she started to her feet with a cry of 
affright. Quivering in every nerve, wild with nameless ter- 
ror, she went down to the chamber she had just left. 

Mrs. Barr still sat by the window. The pure radiance of 
the moon lay full upon the hands clasped in her lap, the 
Quaker cap which framed in that lovely old face — and the 
muslin neckerchief folded over her bosom. Catharine, with 
a sigh of infinite relief, went up to the easy-chair. She was 
not asleep — not even in pain. Those kind, blue eyes were 
open — that gentle mouth had a smile upon it. She was rest- 
ing, Catharine thought, nothing more — evidently resting, 
and did not wish to be disturbed. Had she not asked to be 
left alone? Catharine moved softly to a shadowy part of 
the room and sat down, holding her very breath, in fear of 
disturbing the sick woman, who had not cared to recognize 
her presence. The music from down-stairs rose to her faintly. 
Sometimes the dying echo of a laugh came floating upward ; 
but after a while, all this ceased ; then the stillness in the 
room oppressed her. 

Again Catharine arose and went close to Mrs. Barr’s chair. 

“ Have you had a good rest, dear mother?” she whispered, 
bending closq to the motionless head. 


The Old Mansion-House. 


201 


There was no answer — no sign, no breath that she could 
hear or feel. She saw the eyes turned to the open window — 
the smile still hovering about those lips ; but she also saw 
that the whole face had turned whiter than whiteness. The 
awful silence of the grave was Inere, and she knew that her 
best friend had passed over the “ dark waters ” when that 
shock fell upon her, breaking up alike her hopes and her 
prayers. 


CHAPTER XXXYI. 


THE OLD MANSION-HOUSE. 


FEW old houses still remain among the villas, hotels, 



21 and cottages that make Staten Island a little Eden. 
Many of these are on the shore, and not being so accessible 
as these modern structures, are' of course less known. One 
of these buildings, situated almost in the verge of the Island* 
surrounded by groves of primeval trees, fruit-orchards, and 
flowing thicket;?, must now become the scene of our story. 

The house was an old, rambling affair, with irregular 
wings and a centre building three stories high, with heavy 
stone chimneys, that time itself seemed incapable of de- 
stroying, and a peaked roof, with gable-windows, that, how- 
ever, wer all for outside show, looking only from an open 
garret. It was a substantial edifice, built of stone, but the 
wings were of wood, with verandas and French windows, 
half buried in creeping vines and climbing roses. A tall 
elm-tree towered upward in front of the centre building, sweep- 
ing its long pendent branches over the roof, thus softening 
the contrast between the grim old front with its stone portal, 
and the wings with their fanciful drapery of flowers. The 
ground sloped unevenly from the front of the building, and 
was broken up here and there with fruit-trees and flower- 


202 


The Old Mansion-House. 


thickets, until it was separated from a gentle hill by one of 
those small inland streams that render quiet scenery of this 
kind so beautiful. Here a clump of weeping- willows gave 
their waving and golden green to the air, forming one of 
the most lovely features of a landscape every way Arcadian. 

It was a large house, and the modern portion seemed 
quite unnecessary, save as an embellishment, for two quieter 
people could not well have been found than the old couple 
who had inhabited the centre building, with its antique fur- 
niture and old-fashioned mouldings, for more than half a 
century. 

One day, not far from the time of our last chapter, old 
Mrs. Ford was, or seemed to be, alone in this dwelling ; for 
the kitchen was so far away from the room she occupied, 
that no household-sound reached her. It was a calm June 
day. The air was balmy with fruit-blossoms. The sky was 
softly blue, with a white cloud here and there drifting soft 
snowy billows over it ; for a light rain had just passed away, 
leaving heaps of pearl clouds on the horizon and a world of 
diamond drops among the green-leaves and fruit-blossoms, 
that impregnated them with perfume. 

The window of her sitting-room was open, and Mrs. Ford 
leaned out, not to gaze upon the landscape, though she felt 
all its beauty, but with a keener interest and deeper anxiety 
than mere familiar Nature could afford. 

Her husband, a very old man, had gone to the city, and 
the old lady was anxiously watching his return. It was now 
two hours beyond the time. He had driven a fiery horse 
and was without attendant; what might have happened? 
Why would not her husband be content to drive a staid 
family horse, or take the man-servant with him? Why 
did he go to the city at all ? These might have been her 
reflections on ordinary occasions ; but now a deeper cause 
of anxiety gave keenness to those aged eyes, and sent a 
nervous quiver to those locked hands* whenever a sound 
startled her. 


The Old Mansion-House. 


203 


At last, she distinctly heard a carriage coming down the 
road, and rising slowly from her seat, she walked forth into 
the front porch, where, leaning against one of the stone 
pillars, she stood pale and motionless, save that a quiver ran 
through her frame, somewhat more sharply than should have 
been possible to the simple tremor of old age. 

Decorous old age is always beautiful, and this dear old 
lady, in her dark dress and pure muslin cap scarcely less 
white than the hair it covered, formed a touching picture, 
as she stood in the shadow of her home, waiting — for her 
husband — and alas! for the only child of their love — 
another might come, but the old lady scarcely thought of 
that, her heart was too full. 

Slowly the carriage came up from the road and swept 
around to the front door. The old lady could not move. 
She seemed chained to the stone pillar that supported her. 
A mist, but not of age, crept over her vision, and through 
it she saw her husband descend to the ground, and then, as 
if moving through a cloud, she saw two female forms sink- 
ing, as it were, toward the earth, and coming steadily toward 
her. 

She could not stir or speak, but held out her trembling 
arms. 

A tall, thin woman, whose large brown eyes, full of sorrow- 
ful reproach, seemed to look through and through her, came 
up the steps, paused a moment so close that the trembling 
hands touched her, and walked on without a word. 

Then the old woman cried out in her anguish, — 

“ Oh ! Elsie, Elsie, will you not speak to me?” 

The tall woman turned at this, came a pace back, and 
looked at the old lady with her great, mournful eyes, silent 
as before. 

“Elsie, Elsie ! It is your mother. Speak to me ! ” 

Insanity is sometimes very cruel. How steadily those great 
eyes looked upon the quivering anguish of that beautiful old 


204 


The Old Mansion-House. 


face ! How coldly the woman turned away, and walked 
into the shadows of her old home, holy with so many mem- 
ories, all lost in the darkness that had settled on her brain ! 

Then the old woman sent forth a cry of anguish, and 
reaching out her arms, fell weeping upon her husband’s 
bosom. 

“ She does not know me. Oh ! John, John, I thought she 
would have known me ! ” 

The old man, himself trembling with fatigue and agita- 
tion, bent down and kissed the forehead of his wife. But 
he had no words of comfort to offer. It was a terrible thing 
for an only child to walk thus stonily by the yearning heart 
of a mother. The poor old man wept over his wife ; it was 
all he could do. 

But as his fond arms relaxed, a beautiful comforter ap- 
peared, breaking through the mist that grief had cast over 
those aged eyes like some shadowy angel. Those two 
withered hands were softly clasped, and a sweet, tranquilliz- 
ing voice murmured, — 

“ Do not be troubled ; she is so much better, she must know 
you at last. Have patience, only have a little patience ! ” 

“ I will have patience. Oh ! is that a new thing to me, 
poor bereaved mother that I am?” answered the old lady, 
shedding less bitter tears. “ But who are you that speak so 
confidently, and so well ? ” 

“This — this is the young person who has done so much 
for our Elsie at the asylum,” said the old gentleman. “ She 
has come to stay with her and live with us ! ” 

“What! This young girl, — this pretty, frail creature? 
I thought it was a woman ! ” 

“ And so it is, if suffering can make a poor girl grow old,” 
replied Catharine, mournfully, for it was no other than 
Catharine Lacy, or rather Catharine De Marke, the lost wife, 
or, as she was only known then in that house, Catharine 
Barr. 


The Old Mansion-House. 


205 


“And so you have been good to my Elsie?” persisted the 
old lady, wrapped up in the one idea of her heart so com- 
pletely, that she left the poor girl’s words unheeded. “No 
wonder she loves you so much ! ” 

“ Only wait a while, and she will love you as well. Per- 
haps in a little time she will know that you are her 
mother.” 

“ Do you think so ? Do you really think so ? ” said the 
old lady, with tears in her eyes. 

“ See how she is looking at us ! ” was the reply. 

Mrs. Ford looked up ; and there, in the dim hall, she saw 
her daughter watching them keenly. As their eyes met, 
the aged mother smiled through her tears, and the crazed 
woman began to glide slowly toward her, as if drawn by 
some magnetic force. 

“ Oh, you have done this ! ” cried the old lady, — “ she 
comes this way — shedooks kinder!” and bowing her head, 
with a gush of tenderness she kissed the young girl. 

Instantly the insane woman darted forward and separated 
them. With her hands she held them apart, creeping softly 
toward her mother’s bosom. 

Not a word was spoken. But the swell and beat of that 
aged mother’s heart brought back true life into the cold 
bosom of the daughter. 

“ Mother ! ” she said, lifting up her two palms and smooth- 
ing down the gray hair on each side of that wrinkled fore- 
head. “ Mother, how T white your hair has grown.” 

“ Thank God ! ” cried the aged husband, a$ he saw this. 
And in the flood of tender joy, through which these words 
were spoken, he lifted his clasped hands to heaven. 

The sound, tender and holy as it was, drove that poor 
creature back into her insanity. She turned from her 
mother, looked coldly upon the old man, and then, with a 
faint shake of the head, walked into the house again. 

“ Come,” said the old man, tenderly, to his wife, “ let us 


206 The Old Mansion-House. 

wait God’s time. It is something that she has known you 
for a minute!” 

“Something,” repeated the old lady, overwhelmed with 
gratitude ; “ John, it has given me new life.” 

Hand-in-hand, full of holy faith, and beautiful in the 
deep love of their old age, .they followed Catharine and her 
charge into the family sitting-room. 

“ Sit down here, my daughter, while I take off your bon- 
net and shawl,” said the old lady, wheeling an easy-chair to 
the window. 

Elsie sat down in silence and gazed wistfully in her 
mother’s face, as the aged parent removed the bonnet from 
her head, that poor head whose ever burning heat had scat- 
tered those long black tresses so heavily with snow. 

“ See,” said the woman, trembling beneath the joy of that 
look, “ there is the old pear-tree yet, white with blossoms. 
I am sure we might find half a dozen robins’ nests in the 
boughs, if you were only young enough to climb them, 
Elsie.” 

Elsie smiled. Some vague association seemed breaking 
through her mind. 

“ To-morrow you shall go down there, darling ; father and 
I will go anywhere with you.” 

“ Anywhere?” said Elsie, with a fierce look. “ Then take 
me to him.” 

The old lady recoiled, and looked wistfully at her hus- 
band. 

“ Take me to him , I say ! ” almost shrieked the daughter, 
gazing angrily from her father to her mother. 

“ No, no,” said Catharine, quietly, “ that is for me. They 
must show you nothing but the brook, the birds, and these 
beautiful trees. I must do the rest. Come.” 

As if spellbound, the insane woman arose and followed 
the young girl. 


The Closed Library. 


207 


CHAPTER XXXVII. 


THE CLOSED LIBRARY. 



HENCE came the young woman who made her ad- 


' » vent in the last chapter ? So fair, so gentle in her 
manners, and yet with an authority of character that made 
itself respected, — how came she to know the aged couple, 
whose home was hereafter to be her own? 

They knew that she had been the inmate of an Insane Asy- 
lum ; for there she had learned to love and protect their only 
child, who was all the dearer to them because of her infir- 
mity. They knew that she had entered this institution, under 
the care of as good and true a woman as ever lived, from a 
keen desire to find some place where her daily bread could 
be earned in seclusion, mingled with a gentle wish to benefit 
humanity in some way. 

The desire to do good to others usually brings its own 
opportunity, and Catharine had found that the wish is in 
itself one of the brightest and safest steps toward happiness 
when the soul is troubled. 

It had been the destiny of this young creature to mingle 
with strange scenes before her character had acquired its 
natural strength, and through this fiery furnace her spirit 
came forth pure and strong as gold. 

From her first entrance into the Asylum a singular fas- 
cination drew Catharine toward this woman, whose madness 
was full of childlike trust and poetical refinement. In 
moments of excitement, Elsie’s mind seemed burning with 
thoughts, that in a sane person, capable of conversation and 
contiguity, would have produced thrilling poetry. 

Her grief had a depth of wild pathos in it that won con- 
viction of its reality ; her sadness was plaintive in its ex- 
pression as the notes of a night-bird, when it has no listeners 


208 


The Closed Library . 


but the quiet stars and motionless leaves. Her joy was 
that of a child, wayward and mischievous sometimes, at 
others full of graceful wit. But these moods seldom came 
to brighten her monotonous existence. 

Elsie 'Ford’s insane life had been, of late, mournfully 
poetic, helpless, and gentle. She was possessed by broken 
fancies and yearning desires for some far-off object, which 
she mentioned vaguely and with a confused strain of affec- 
tion, always speaking of him, but without name. She 
would shrink back with a sort of terror when any one in- 
quired directly who this being was, who wove his memory 
with her thoughts forever, and yet seemed a myth even to 
her. 

This gentle frame of mind had come upon Elsie after 
Catharine had given up so much of her own life in her be- 
half. It is not remarkable that a young creature who had 
been herself friendless, came to love this woman, almost as 
if she had been the child in years that she had become in 
mind. Elsie returned this affection in her own wild way, 
giving through her heart the love and obedience which her 
brain could neither understand nor control. 

This change in the condition of Elsie Ford led to a 
yearning desire in her aged parents to have her once more 
under their own roof. It was admitted by the physician 
that a residence at home might prove beneficial to a patient 
who seemed to be gradually collecting her stray thoughts 
into form under the loving guidance of her nurse. ^ 

This decision with regard to Elsie Ford had been made 
about the time of Mrs. Barr’s death, and the old people, by 
message and letter, made a pathetic appeal to Catharine, 
beseeching her to take up her abode with them, and still act 
as a guardian angel to their daughter. 

Catharine remembered the dying counsel of her friend, 
and gladly accepted the position. Indeed, Elsie Ford was 
now the only human being who seemed to connect her with 


209 


The Closed Library , 

the world. So she followed this one object of her love, not 
as a nurse, — that was unnecessary now, — but with the de- 
votion of a child, or a younger sister, kindly giving up her 
own life to another. 

Thus, from her long residence in the Insane Asylum, Cath- 
arine came with her patient to make a new home on the 
Island. 

It was like Paradise, that serene abode, full of quietness, 
and surrounded with the fresh luxuriance of spring. After 
the hushed turmoil of an insane asylum, where the atmos- 
phere was heavy with suppressed groans, and wild cries 
sometimes broke the midnight stillness, the repose of this old 
house was indeed Heaven. 

The old people, with their refined simplicity, so still and 
almost caressing in every word and movement, were in gen- 
tle harmony with the place. For the first time in her life, 
Catharine breathed with a deep, full sense of enjoyment. 

There was a library in the old house, filled with such 
books as lead to thought, suggesting grand ideas to the im- 
agination, and strengthening the reason. An intellect of no 
ordinary cultivation must have selected these volumes, for 
they were in various languages, and each work was of the 
choice productions of its nation. 

Catharine remarked that none of these volumes had been 
printed within the last thirty years, though up to that period 
the literature of many nations was gathered. This fact 
gave her food for thought, and with a curiosity unnatural 
to her, she began to conjecture for what purpose and by 
whom this rare collection had been made. Why had it 
been discontinued so suddenly, and how chanced it that a 
library of so much value in all respects had been left 
untouched, till the dust of years almost obscured the orig- 
inal richness of the bindings? 

Another thing aroused conjecture also. The library was 
on the ground-floor, occupying the extreme end of one wing 
13 


210 


The Closed Library . 


of the building, to which a large bay-window had been 
added, filling the room with pure light and enlarging it 
at the same time. 

When Catharine first entered the room, about a week 
after her arrival on the Island, it was buried in darkness, 
for long wooden shutters were closed over the windows ; and 
though it Avas early daylight, when the fresh, young morn- 
ing was full of brightness, she was almost repulsed by the 
dusty and dim atmosphere. 

But she had received permission to visit every part of the 
house, and use anything it contained at discretion, for the 
comfort of herself and her companion. 

With considerable effort she forced open the sashes and 
flung back the shutters from the dusty panes. The morn- 
ing sunshine came up through the valley in its first golden 
brightness, and drifting through the pendent branches of a 
weeping-elm that sheltered the whole Aving, poured itself in a 
flood through the window, till dust floated like a cloud of 
golden motes all around. 

It seemed to her almost like sacrilege, thus to have let in 
a broad light on the obscurity of so many years. The book- 
cases of dark wood, richly carved and set with plate-glass, 
took the sudden radiance gloomily, and glimpses of the 
gilded bindings came dimly through the accumulated dust. 
The bronze medallions that formed centre-pieces over each 
case were scarcely discernible, and the crimson hangings 
upon the wall behind, though embossed Avith a deep velvet 
pattern, seemed faded to a brown tint. 

The tAvo sides of the room were occupied by these book- 
cases ; but on each side the door, which opened opposite the 
bay-AvindoAv, several pictures were hung, veiled Avith cob- 
Avebs, and their costly frames gleaming out from wreaths of 
dust. 

Two or three chairs of various patterns stood under 
these pictures, and slender bronze statues, each holding a 


211 


The Closed Library. . 

gilded branch for lights in its hand, poised themselves on 
either side of the window. In two of these branches, wax 
candles, half consumed, still remained, while others had 
burned low, leaving the sockets full of wax, now of a dull 
gray color. 

As Catharine looked around, she felt the desolation of the 
change oppressive, and half-closed the shutters, thus preserv- 
ing the partial gloom which seemed so congenial to the place. 

Why was it that this scene of neglected splendor, this 
treasure of intellectual wealth, half buried in the past, fell 
so gloomily on her spirits ? What was the room to her ? 
And why was she there, except to ascertain what capacities 
of home comfort the place afforded for her unfortunate 
charge ? 

She could not answer these questions. Her heart beat 
heavily, and her eyes grew dim with a sort of foreboding 
terror, as she looked around. Yet a strange infatuation kept 
her in the room. She longed to know what the books con- 
tained, by whom they had been collected, and by whom read. 

This curiosity at last overcame the pressure upon her 
nerves. She arose, and opening a fold of the shutters again, 
surveyed the room a second time. It was early sunrise, and 
she had a full hour before Elsie would awake, or the family 
be abroad. 

As the light gradually flooded the room, she became self- 
possessed and more resolute. The superstitious sensation, 
that had at first swept her nerves, yielded to a feeling of 
imaginative curiosity. She opened one of the bookcases 
almost with a feeling that it had life, and could be pained 
with the sharp wrench which she was obliged to give the lock 

As I have said, the books were in various languages, and 
Catharine could read but two, her native tongue and French, 
which she had caught up almost without effort, by painful 
associations in early life with persons to whom that lan- 
guage was most familiar ; but she took down the Italian, 


212 


The Closed Library . 


German, and Spanish authors, with that vague reverence 
which we always feel for a thing beyond our comprehension, 
and was seized with a quick thirst of the knowledge they 
contained. 

Here was a new world for the young woman, a world of 
fresh sensations and never-ending variety. She had fallen 
unawares upon a mine of thought, unappropriated, beauti- 
tiful thought, from which she might carry away new life, 
and not diminish the original stock by a single idea. Here 
was happiness ! here was a solace for the baffled hopes and 
recoiling affections that had burdened her soubso long. She 
would no longer seek for joy among the living. The dead 
had left her the essence of their lives, and she would read 
their books, she would learn all these strange languages. 
She would live in the past lives of those who had become 
benefactors to humanity, by gathering the immortality which 
belongs to them from the past, for the benefit of genera- 
tions yet to come. 

With these aspirations, Catharine turned over the pages 
of an Italian poem, that she had taken from the shelves. 
The very strangeness of the words had its fascination. She 
panted to wrestle with her own ignorance, and overcome it 
with a single effort. 

But a sound in the house awoke Catharine from this 
train of thought. She had duties to perform. Life was not 
given that it might be wasted in vague dreams and useless 
expectations. She closed the book, and wandered around 
the room, anxious to redeem it from its state of neglect, and 
yet reluctant to disturb the repose in which every object had 
rested so. long. 

As she stood, a light breeze swept up the valley and blew 
one of the shutters open, filling the room with light again. 
She noticed, now, a small mosaic table, half shrouded with a 
heap of what had been drapery cast over some object in the 
centre. Catharine lifted this drapery and found underneath 


213 


The Closed Library . 

a gilded bird-cage, which, protected as it had been from the 
atmosphere, looked comparatively bright. The bottom was 
covered with seed husks, and among them, lay a little heap 
of gold-tinted feathers, which seemed like a sleeping canary. 
But as Catharine bent over it, her breath disturbed the 
feathers, and they began to quiver, while one or two were 
dislodged and floated softly through the wires. 

Again Catharine was saddened. How many years must 
it have been, since the poor bird, of which nothing now re- 
mained but the plumage, had starved to death in its cage ? 
Who could have been so cruel ? What evil thing had left 
all this gloom and desolation behind it ? 

She lifted the cage softly and wiped the dust from the 
black marble on which it stood. With the first sweep of 
her hand there shone out, from the glittering stone, a wreath 
of white jessamine and orange-blossoms, inlaid into the jetty 
surface with that exquisite skill known best to the Floren- 
tine artizans. Leaves of malachite, veined with many tints 
of green, were interspersed with the blossoms, and all looked 
fresh and pure as if the stone mockery had been wrought 
but yesterday. 

Here was a new theme of interest for Catharine. Some 
bridal garland seemed to have left its shadow on the stone, 
only to mock her curiosity. Surely all these strange and 
beautiful objects could not have been gathered for the enjoy- 
ment of these two old people ; for then they never would 
have been so completely left to moulder into ruin. 

When conjecture reached this point, she was called from 
the room by the low tinkle of a breakfast-bell, which warned 
her of the hours she had unconsciously given to this unsat- 
isfactory train of thought. She hurriedly shook the dust 
from her garments, and went out with a strange, guilty feel- 
ing, as if she had been intruding into a sacred place. 

How pleasantly the old people received her, as she entered 
the little breakfast-room that morning; and how could she 


214 


The Family Breakfast 

help the red flush that rose to her temple, when they kindly 
inquired what had occupied her all the morning. 

Catharine was about to answer, but a glance from Elsie, 
who looked unusually serious and tranquil as she sat by her 
mother, w T as an unaccountable check upon her. There was 
no meaning in that dark, mournful look, and Catherine had 
encountered it a thousand times ; but some unacknowledged 
intuition kept her silent ; she could not force herself to speak 
of the room which she had just left. 


CHAPTER XXXVIII. 

THE FAMILY BREAKFAST.. 

C ATHARINE did not speak of her employment that 
morning. Some unaccountable restraint was upon her, 
and she could not force her tongue to ask the questions that 
were constantly forming themselves in her mind. 

The old people were unusually quiet and gentle. Pleasant 
dreams, or, what is perhaps better, innocent thoughts, had 
filled their souls with sweet serenity. Since their daughter 
had returned, imperfect in temper and intellect as she was, 
their home had brightened into a Paradise around them. 
They called the poor woman by a thousand sweet terms of 
endearment, as if she had been still a child, and they in- 
dulging in the first bright joys of parental life. 

It was beautiful to watch the holy workings of nature in 
those old hearts, as they sat by the breakfast-table that 
bright spring morning side by side, with their daughter, who 
was languidly reposing in an easy-chair on the opposite side 
of the table. In the wanderings of her intellect, she had 
retained exaggerated vestiges of a taste originally luxurious 
and imaginative. Now the dress, which had once been 


215 


The Family Breakfast. 

splendid, became picturesque, and at times fantastic, but it 
was always arranged with a certain effect that bespoke great 
original refinement. She delighted in strong contrasts, 
rather than incongruities of color, and invariably rejected 
all fabrics that were not the most delicate and costly of their 
kind. In a store-room overhead she had found a wardrobe 
that had once been fashionable and costly, and the discovery 
had seemed to give her inexhaustible pleasure. 

This morning she had arrayed herself with peculiar care. 
Her white muslin robe was elaborately embroidered down 
the front and over the bosom. She wore dainty slippers of 
crimson Russian leather, embossed with gold ; and had tied 
a small lace handkerchief under her chin, which mingled 
softly with the profuse wealth of tresses, which she had been 
at great pains to train in long ringlets, evidently with some 
vague reminiscence of her childhood. There was nothing 
very fantastic in this, certainly, but the kerchief on her head, 
and the muslin of her robe, was of that pale yellow tinge, 
which nothing but time can give ; and the gold upon her 
slippers was tarnished till it seemed like bronze. 

Besides this, poor Elsie had made still more striking ad, 
ditions to her toilet. Over the muslin robe she wore an 
ample gown of crimson satin, lined with a lighter tinge of 
red, which w 7 as fastened at the waist with a belt of black 
morocco, united in front by an antique golden clasp. 

There was something about this dress, and in the evident 
satisfaction with which Elsie exhibited herself in it, that 
touched some hidden memory in the old people. They 
looked at each other furtively, as if anxious to know what 
impression it was making ; and at last the old lady’s eyes 
quietly filled with tears, while a flush stole over her hus- 
band’s forehead, as if old memories were carrying the blood 
hotly to his brain. 

Catharine saw all this, and it added to the perplexity of 
her thoughts. But no one spoke. After a little, the old 


216 


The Family Breakfast 

man bent his head with a sort of start, as if the thought had 
just struck him, and asked a blessing on the food, a duty 
which had never been delayed before for many a long year 
by any worldly thought. Catharine remarked that his voice 
was indistinct, and the few words which fell from his lips 
came singly and at intervals, as with an effort of pain. 

Elsie had not spoken all the morning. There she sat, in 
her easy-chair, eying her strange dress with a vague smile, 
as if wholly absorbed by it. She shook out the satin folds 
of her robe, tightened the golden clasp at her waist, and 
smoothed down the yellow and costly lace that fell over her 
hands, with dim self-complacency, smiling now and then on 
her parents, but uttering never a w T ord. At length she 
seemed satisfied with her finery, and turned her eyes upon 
the window. 

“ Shall I open it ? ” said the dear old lady, still with tears 
in her eyes. 

The daughter did not reply, but a soft smile came to her 
eyes, which still looked longingly through the sash. An 
old pear-tree was just in $ght, clouded with white blossoms ; 
and a pleasant wind sighed through a thicket of lilac- 
bushes and snow-balls, that grew nearer to the window, 
shaking their dew and perfume upon the air. 

The smile upon Elsie’s lips grew brighter. She stood up, 
and looked earnestly through the window. A gleam of in- 
telligence shot over her face. 

“ Ihe beehives, the beehives — who has broken up my 
beehives ? ” she murmured, in a tone of vague displeasure. 
“ What have they done with my beehives, mother ?” 

The old woman’s eyes glistened through their tears. It 
was the second time that Elsie had called her mother ; and 
the very heart seemed blossoming afresh in her bosom, as 
she listened to the holy sound. 

The beehives — Elsie’s beehives ? Alas! they had been 
taken away from beneath the old pear-tree more than twenty 


217 


The Family Breakfast 

years ago. The bees had been left to plunder the adjoining 
thickets and clover-fields, year after year, while no one 
touched the honey ; and thus they had hivech in neglect, 
dispersed, and left their cells empty so long that the old 
people had almost forgotten that they ever existed. 

“ The bees ! oh, Elsie ! they have gone to the woods,” said 
the old man, in a voice of touching apology. “ We did not 
kill them; we never gathered an ounce of their honey. You 
do not mind that they are gone, Elsie dear ? ” 

“ Oh,” answered Elsie, wearily, as if the effort to remem- 
ber had exhausted her, — “ gone, are they ? what for ? why 
did they go ? How everything slides, slides, slides away, and 
I keep running after, forever and forever running after. 
Oh ! I am tired.” 

The old people looked at one another, and at Catharine, 
hopefully. 

“Let her rest,” said Catharine, in a gentle whisper. 
“ Perhaps it may end better than we think ! ” 

“Yes,” said the old man, stealthj|y clasping the withered 
hand of his wife. “ Let us watch. She may wander back 
to her youth again, and forget all that has passed.” 

“ It may be so — God help the poor child — it may be so,” 
murmured the old lady, casting looks of wistful tenderness 
across the table, while her daughter began to eat daintily, 
putting on airs like a child entrusted with a fork for the 
first time. 

It was remarkable that the old lady never spoke of her 
daughter, though an elderly woman with waves of gray in 
her hair, except as “ the child,” or “ the. dear young crea- 
ture.” To her, those white hairs had no significance of age, 
but were the marks of a deep sorrow, over which the mother’s 
heart mourned perpetually. 

The breakfast w r as finished in silence. Catharine, usually 
so attentive to every movement of her charge, sat preoccu- 
pied and thoughtful. The old people dropped back into 


218 


The two Portraits . 


their habitual calm, and Elsie still amused herself by ar* 
ranging and re-arranging the folds of her robe, claiming 
admiration for the effect, by child-like glances at he* mother. 
Perhaps they were right ; the woman certainly did seem to 
be going back to her childishness again. 


CHAPTER XXXIX. 

THE TWO PORTRAITS. 

W HEN Catharine arose to go, Elsie, following out the 
wilful instincts of her new character, crept close to old 
Mrs. Ford, and clung to her dress, entreating to be left ; 
which flung the old couple into a state of absolute delight 
beautiful to behold. It was the first time their child 
had been content to remain alone with them since her so- 
journ in the house. JNow she clung pleadingly to her 
mother’s dress, and, seating herself upon a low stool at her 
feet, began to amuse herself by arranging scraps of silk, 
which she found in her mother’s work-basket, with great 
nicety as to the colors, which made the old people look at 
each other with mournful smiles ; it put them so in mind of 
old times, when she was indeed a child, body and mind. 

Meantime Catharine had gone back to the library. She 
would summon no help, but, closing the door which shut 
her out from the rest of the house, began to work diligently, 
cleansing the books from dust, and re-arranging everything 
exactly as she had found it. In the progress of her task, 
she was constantly falling upon some new object of interest. 
The books we have spoken of held forth a sort of enchant- 
ment which turned her from work. The bronze medallions 
took a new interest after the dust had been removed from 
their delicate lines. But beyond this was a vague feeling 


The two Portraits . 


219 


that she had a personal interest in redeeming those beauti- 
ful objects from neglect. The very atmosphere of the place 
seemed Tamil iar, as if she had breathed it before. At any 
rate, a new vista of life opened to her from that room. It 
contained the means of knowledge, the power which should 
be to her in the place of lost happiness. 

In a day or two this room was entirely in order, but it 
was only at intervals that Catharine could visit it, and her 
labors were performed with a guilty feeling, as if every wave 
of her brush must inflict a pang upon the old people who 
trusted her so thoroughly. 

Had any one asked the girl why it was that she left the 
pictures to the last, and the meaning of the strange thrill 
that checked her whenever she approached them, no answer 
could have been obtained. She would have called it a foolish 
superstition, perhaps. Indeed, she did chide herself more 
than once for the vague feeling that possessed her, and im- 
puted it to the general impression that she was intruding on 
sacred grounds, which had seized i%on her from the first. 

When all was finished, the crimson drapery taken from 
the table and arranged that it might flow over the bay 
window, or fall in rich waves against the black-walnut case- 
ment on each side; when the great library-chairs were dusted 
and in place, and the mosaic table shone out clear and 
bright, with the bird-cage in the centre, she turned slowly 
and walked toward the pictures. 

Again the strange chill arrested her. A thin veil of gauze 
hung like a dusty cobweb over the paintings, and the frames 
gleamed out dim and misty from the crimson walls. She 
stood and wondered, holding her breath. How many years 
had that dusty web concealed the canvas which she was 
hesitating to look upon ? Who had placed it there ? Why 
had it never been removed ? Perhaps it might prove the 
portrait of old Mr. Ford, or that dear old gentlewoman, his 
wife. 


220 


The two Portraits . 


These thoughts kept her motionless till curiosity became 
painful. With a faint laugh at her own irresolution, she 
sprang upon a library-chair and tore away the gauze. 

What a beautiful creature she must have been, this Elsie 
Ford, with those lustrous eyes, that peachy bloom of the 
cheek, and those lips so full and ripe, like strawberries with 
the June sunshine upon them, the smile hovering like the 
shadow of a honey-bee about the mouth, dimpling it softly 
at the corners. How beautiful Elsie Ford must have been ! 

Catharine’s eyes filled as she looked upon the portrait, and 
traced back its dim resemblance to the stricken woman whom 
she had just left, catching like an infant at the sunbeams 
that came into her chamber-window. The bright, beautiful 
life, so charming in the picture, had all faded out from the 
original being. That image on the canvas seemed vital, 
Elsie the picture. Catharine sunk down to the easy-chair 
and wept. 

After a time she went to the pendant of this picture, still 
oppressed by the strang#dread which had followed her ever 
since she first entered the room. A sweep of her hand car- 
ried away the gauze from this portrait also, and that which 
was behind seemed to chill her into marble. She did not 
breathe, the color left her lips, and she retreated slowly 
backward, mute and astonished. 

It was the portrait of her husband, the man who had 
abandoned her and her child to disgrace and starvation. 
Her own husband, for say what they would, deny it as he 
might, the man yonder, smiling upon her from the crimson 
of the wall, with his clear gray eyes and chestnut hair, was 
her husband. All the perjury on earth could not change 
the truth. 

It was a terrible shock, this sudden appearance of the 
man who had wronged her. How frankly those eyes looked 
down into hers; that smile hovering around the fine mouth! 
her heart swelled to meet it with a great throb of joy. Those 


The two Portraits. 


221 


carls — chestnut with a gleam of gold in them — how often 
had she swept them together in masses with her own hand, 
and laughed at the air of playful impatience with which he 
had shaken them back to their place on his white temples. 

Oh, these memories were too sweet and too painful. The 
joy of the past was upon it in a bright, rosy cloud, but un- 
derneath lay the black thought that he had wronged and 
left her; even as she looked on the picture, it was there, 
darting like a flash of lightning through her heart. 

In this struggle of joy and anguish she sat down, gazing 
up wistfully at the portrait, and though she knew that it was 
inanimate, beseeching it to speak one word, and tell her that he 
w T as blameless, — that the miserly old woman, his mother, 
had maligned him, and she would believe his first breath, 
believe even a look against the whole world, against facts, 
against truth itself. 

Thus, half madly, the poor girl, the wife who had no hus- 
band, who had been a mother and was childless, pleaded 
with the dumb, smiling picture. 

At last the sound of her own voice fell back upon her like 
a mockery. She hushed her weeping and grew still, but the 
yearning affections, wdiich are the perfume of womanhood, 
struggled out of passion into thought. She pondered over 
her whole life, not yet a long one, not really eventful, for 
the most terrible suffering more frequently springs from 
commonplace circumstances than from startling romance. 
It was a life of feeling, of endurance and doubt, rather than 
action — so far destiny had been wrought out for her. She 
had neither chosen nor rejected it, gloomy as it had always 
been. Save the few months in which love had filled her 
dreary lot with sunshine, so glorious that her heart ached to 
think of it, existence to her had been a dreary thing. But 
the very absence of earthly friends had unconsciously lifted 
her thoughts to a higher and holier power, and there she 
had learned to look trustingly. She was young, too, and 


222 


The Bird-Cage. 


healthy ; thus life was not altogether a desert, though some 
of it had been spent in an insane asylum, and the rest marked 
by orphanage and desertion. 

Desertion, ah ! there was the doubt, which had never yet 
been entirely put to rest. Now, with that bright, honest 
face looking down upon her from the wall, her whole nature 
rose up against the conviction. He had died suddenly, or 
something would yet arise to clear him from the evil sus- 
picions that she — wretch that she was — had dared to har- 
bor against him. 

These thoughts became a conviction. Her face, still wet 
w T ith tears, was bathed with smiles. A holy faith in him 
she had loved so truly filled her soul, and the happiness 
therefrom rose and sparkled like starlight all around her. 
Her hands were softly clasped ; her lips murmured a prayer 
for the forgiveness she would not grant to herself. She be- 
gan to love the old library and everything in it, for was it 
not the scene of this sweet revelation? She had found her 
husband again. 


CHAPTER XL. 

* 

THE BIRD-CAGE. 

# 

A S Catharine sat pondering over these thoughts, full of 
happiness and thanksgiving, the door was softly opened, 
and Elsie Ford stole in cautiously, like a timid child that 
had gone wilfully astray. 

Catharine sat buried in the easy-chair with her back to 
the light, which lay full upon the two pictures. Languid 
from the emotions through which she had just passed, and 
held in thrall by the very quiet with which Elsie had en- 
tered, she sat motionless, watching the poor creature as she 
glided through the room. 


223 


The Bird-Cage . 

The crimson drapery had been drawn over the arch of 
the window, falling a little apart in the centre, through 
which came a column of light upon the portraits, leaving the 
remainder of the library bathed, as it were, in the gloom of 
a warm twilight. 

For a moment Elsie looked around as if bewildered. She 
had flung aside her crimson robe after one elaborate toilet, 
and now appeared in a plain morning-dress of pure white, 
loose from the shoulders down. A band of scarlet chenille, 
twisted lightly together, gathered up the long tresses of her 
hair, which she had arranged in fantastic waves and masses 
back of her head, as we find it in antique statues. In truth, 
all Elsie’s fantasies in dress had a classic grace about them, 
■which perhaps sprung from some early taste, brightened into 
the picturesque by insanity. Thus, in her cloud-like white 
dress, and with the glowing scarlet in her hair, she moved 
across the room, pausing every step or two, and listening as 
if she feared that some one might follow her. 

A gleam of sharp intelligence shot across her face as she 
saw the bird-cage, and darting toward it, she opened the door, 
chirping softly with her lips, as if to call the bird forth. 
But the jar that she had given to the cage, and the air set 
in motion by her drapery, took up the heap of plumage that 
she had taken for a bird, and sent it floating through the 
room. 

Elsie dropped her hand from the cage-door, and drooping 
downward in sad despondency, turned her head from side to 
side, gazing with a woe-begone countenance at the feathers 
as they quivered from her sight and settled down like soft 
gleams of gold in the dusky corners. 

“Gone, gone; all alike, all alike,” she muttered, in a 
low, tearful voice. “So it is always, always; everything 
that loves me dies — everything that I love melts into air, 
or turns into some wicked creature and stings me. My poor 
bird, my pretty canary, why did I come ? Why did I let 


224 


The Bird-Cage . 

these wicked hands touch his cage? they have driven him off, 
turned him into a wasp that will sting, sting, sting, oh ! ^ 

She shrunk back from the light, and held out her hands 
with the palms outward, as if warding off the insects that 
she fancied herself to have created. 

“ I can’t help it — how can I? If these cruel things start 
to life with a touch of my finger, it is his fault, not mine ; 
he drained the life from my soul and filled it with this wick- 
edness. If it kills all beautiful things, and turns them into 
vipers and stinging insects that come back upon me for food, 
eating and biting at my temples day and night, how can I 
help it?” 

The poor woman uttered these wild words with a low cry 
of anguish, fighting the air with one hand, and gathering the 
folds of her white robe up over her face with the other, as if 
to protect it from harm. 

At last she looked up fearfully and with a shudder. 
What she deemed the swarm of yellow wasps no longer flew 
across the light, for the feathers had settled upon the floor, 
and their absence seemed to give her relief. 

As the drapery fell from her face, it was clasped again 
between her folded hands, while a dull stillness fell upon 
her. She was looking at her ow T n picture. 

Catharine held her breath, for she was awe-stricken by the 
changes that swept over that pale face. Never, in all the 
vagaries of her insanity, had she seen that expression on 
Elsie’s features till now. 

At first the face took an expression of dull surprise, min- 
gled with an under-current of contempt, as if she fancied 
that some one were attempting to impose upon her. She 
drew a step nearer, holding her breath, advancing timidly 
as if she expected it to fly away at her approach, as the bird 
had done. When she saw that it remained crowned with 
light and smiling upon her, the poor women stole closer, 
and at last touched it with her fingers. 


225 


The Bird-Cage . . 

A look of wild amazement swept over her face. It had 
not disappeared with her touch. It smiled upon her yet. 
No venomous thing had sprung from those parted and smil- 
ing lips. It was herself gazing upon herself. She was 
there — and it was there — oh ! how that poor brain worked 
and toiled to solve the question of its double self. Was she, 
the creature of pain, with her temples full of fire, which had 
no power to melt the snow from her hair, an evil growth 
from the loveliness before her, and that perfect still ? After 
wandering so many years, with age upon her limbs, and a 
curse at her heart, had she come back upon her own young 
self to be met with smiles and pleasant looks, as if no wick- 
edness had ever crept between them ? 

How was it that this beautiful woman, Elsie Ford, Elsie, 
— no, no, she would not speak or think the name that would 
wound the beautiful young creature, for the world she 
wouldn’t do it, — she who knew so well what pain was, and 
how sharp a pang the sound of that name had been before 
her own heart became so clouded and heavy. No, she 
would be very kind to the poor young creature ; it would be 
a pity to drive that smile away, and see those red lips grow- 
ing pale and blue with such lurid words as she could utter, 
but would not. 

But how came Elsie Ford there, surrounded by so many 
beautiful objects, and with the sunlight dancing and spark- 
ling over her hair, as she had seen it playing upon the neck 
of a raven ? She remembered well that these long tresses 
had been cut off*, and the dress of amber brocade taken 
away. In its place — oh, she remembered that with a cry 
of anguish — in place of that robe they had bound her 
arms under a hempen garment, so strong, and scant, and 
coarse. 

Oh! she remembered more, a thousand times more! but it 
was all so confused, flame, smoke, tears, cries breaking 
around her as she had seen (for Elsie had climbed the 
U 


226 


The Bird-Cage . 

fiery mountain) Vesuvius, clad in aslies, and crowned with 
clouds of smoky flame. 

But how was all this? How had Elsie Ford come out 
from this fiery furnace so beautiful, so pleasant to look upon? 
It troubled her poor brain to make it all out. Ah ! now 
she had it once more: Elsie had not been into the valley 
and shadow of death. It was herself only, the evil growth 
cast off by the beautiful one, who had been so full of trouble. 
He had not killed Elsie, only herself ; not even that. Death 
would have been very pleasant at his hands ; that was per- 
haps why he had let her suffer so much, but not die. 

Poor Elsie ! Some gleams of reason were struggling 
through all this wild talk, and this confusion of thoughts, 
and every ray of consciousness was a pang. 

She turned from the picture at length, shaking her head 
wearily, as if the struggle for memory had worn her out. 
Then her eyes fell upon the other portrait, the handsome, 
bright-looking man who had left so strange an impression 
upon Catharine. 

Her eyes grew larger ; her lips parted, and with a long, 
breathless gaze she sunk slowly to the floor, like a snow- 
wreath touched by the sun. 

Catharine arose and bent over the prostrate woman. 

“ Elsie, dear Elsie, speak to me ! ” 

There was a movement of the white drapery, and a low 
moan. 

“ They are together ; they two together yet, and I, oh, 
me — oh, me ! ” 

She did not lift her head again, but went trembling and 
drooping from the library, moaning all the way. 


Nurses for the Children of the Poor . 


227 


CHAPTER XLI. 

NURSES FOR THE CHILDREN OF THE POOR. 

I MUST go back a year or two, and take up an event, 
which happened during Catharine’s sojourn in the In- 
sane Asylum. 

An old man, gray-haired, and with a most bland counte- 
nance, cordial and ruddy, lighted by those soft chestnut- 
brown eyes that are always so pleasant of expression, sat 
behind his desk in the Almshouse building at the Park. 
It was visiting-day in his department, when all the orphan 
infants, put out to nurse by the city, were expected to be 
brought to the office for inspection, or for such changes as 
time made necessary. 

It was a strange scene, at times painfully revolting, and 
again full of natural pathos. One after another, these poor 
little pauper souls were brought in, wrapped in an old 
shawl or torn blanket, motherless, or worse than mother- 
less, — their very existence the growth of sin, or of misfor- 
tunes almost as bitter. The women who carried them were 
usually but one degree removed from the Almshouse them- 
selves, and became the paid mothers of these miserable 
children, in order to save their own offspring from the same 
terrible fate. 

Some of these women were kind, and gave themselves lov- 
ingly to their infant charges, yielding their hearts to hu- 
manity without reservation. These took their seats in the 
outer office, with quiet and serene faces, folding their orphan 
babies in their arms, with a soft, motherly instinct that had 
no thought of the searching eyes turned upon them, but 
waited serenely in an atmosphere of honest love. Others, 
cruel and crafty, were anxious only to pass examination, and 


228 


Nurses for the Children of the Poor . 

obtain the money which was to repay the forced succor they 
had given the forlorn children in their arms. These women 
were often seized with paroxysms of affection, as they ranged 
themselves to wait, and fell to caressing the poor infants 
with revolting fondness, hugging them to bosoms that loathed 
the contact, and kissing the poor lips from which their cruel 
hands would gladly have withheld the very food necessary 
to life. % 

Among these women, some motherly from nature, others 
cruel against nature, there came a little Irish woman, plump 
and rosy, and evidently of a cheerful habit, better clad 
and better looking every way than her companions. She held 
a beautiful little boy by the hand, who came reluctantly, 
lifting his fine eyes to her face with a wondering, anxious 
look, and dragging back shyly, half-hiding behind her gown, 
as he approached the crowd of strange women. ' 

The poor creature had evidently been crying. Her eyes 
were red, and her rosy cheeks tear-stained, while her plump 
lips seemed laden with suppressed sobs, that threatened to 
break forth afresh every time her eyes fell upon the boy, 
who was so anxious to hide himself in her garments. 

“Mammy, mammy, take me home; don’t stay here, 
mammy ; let ’s go home,” pleaded the boy, pulling her gown 
with both his plump hands, while she lingered to wipe the 
tears from her eyes. “ I won’t stay ; I won’t speak to that 
man ; he makes you cry.” 

Mary Margaret could not answer him, but a great sob 
burst from her lips, and snatching him up, she buried her 
face in his bosom. 

The little fellow drew back, and laid a soft palm on each 
cheek, while he looked — oh ! so lovingly, into her eyes. 

' “Don’t, mammy, don’t; please don’t — home, go home!” 
he said, grieved and wondering. 

“ I can’t, I can’t ; they won’t let me take you home 
again. My heart is broke. Oh ! it’s got a pain that’ll last 


229 


Nurses for the Children of the Poor . 

forever. Eddie, my darlint, put your two blissid little hants 
together, as if ye was prayen’ to the Virgin herself, me boy ; 
and ask the gentleman to let yees go back wid yer own 
nurse.” 

Eddie patted her cheeks again, while his beautiful lips 
began to quiver, and his eyes filled with tears. 

“ Yes, yes, don’t cry any more. Eddie will tell him ; 
don’t cry ; he will.” 

Struggling down from the poor woman’s arms, the little 
fellow clenched his small white fists, and rubbed the tears 
from his baby-eyes, half-grieved, half-belligerent, while he 
marched up to the superintendent, who greeted him with an 
extended hand, smiling kindly. 

“ Well, Eddie, my boy, where ’s your hand ? ” 

Eddie hid his little clenched fist in the folds of his dress, 
and received these advances with a defiant pout. 

“ Mammy wants me to go home, and I will go home ! ” he 
said, while his little form swelled and struggled with a rising 
sob. 

“ And so you shall, to a nice, big home, where you will 
have lots of little boys to play with.” 

“ I don’t want no boys to play with, but Pat and mammy,” 
answered the little fellow, walking backward toward his 
nurse. * 

“But you shall live in a grand, big house.” 

“ Mammy lives in a grand, big house,” answered the child, 
quite convinced that his shanty-home was equal to any 
palace. “ I like her grand home ! ” 

“ But mammy has n’t got cherry-trees, and apple-orchards, 
and meadows full of clover,” said the officer, amused, and 
yet touched by the child’s resolute air. ^ . 

“But she’s got morning-glories, and — and red beans, and 
oh, dear! she’s got everything — she has,” cried the child, 
with a burst of tearful eloquence. 

“ Mister,” said Mary Margaret, approaching the officer in 


230 


Nurses for the Children of the Poor . 

her motherly sorrow, “ if ye ’d only let the little felly stay a 
bit longer, till he’s big enough to wear jacket and trousers, 
ye know ; he’s backard-like, ye see, and wants good motherly 
nursin’ more ’n a three-months child.” 

The officer shook his head, and Mary Margaret looked 
wofully down upon the little fellow, who was striving to 
envelop himself in the folds of her calico dress. 

“ He ’s no mother but me, yer honor. It ’d kill him in- 
tirely to go up yonder with the rest, and have all his beauti- 
ful curls cut short, and — and, oh! yer honor, it’ll be the 
death of us both — it will. Could n’t ye be merciful this 
onest ? Consither he ’s a poor, motherless crathur, and only 
me to look up to in the wide worlt ! ” 

Again the officer shook his head, but there was relenting 
and sympathy in his eyes. How could he help it, with that 
frank, pleading look fixed upon him, and the pretty child 
peeping out wistfully from the shelter of her garments. 

“ Indeed, Mrs. Dillon, I am sorry, but we have stretched 
a point in this case already, in consideration of your affec- 
tion for the boy. The law is that all children, dependent 
on the city, must be removed to the institution when they 
are two years old. Now we know ‘that little Eddie there is 
almost three, and he must take his chance with the rest.” 

Poor Mary Margaret’s countenance fell, and Eddie made 
a grand effort to draw her away by force. 

“ Home ! ” he pleaded, “ home, mammy ; I will go home! ” 
“ It may be,” said Mary Margaret, determined not to give 
up while a hope was left. “ It may be yer honor thinks it ’s 
the dollar a week I want ; and it ’s bad enough me and the 
childer need it, anyhow; but if ye’d but consint, I’d take 
Eddy, the crathur, for half price, an’ ’d think it a bargain, 
yer honor. If the old man had a word agin it, d’ ye see, 
I’d sit up anights, and do another ’xtra gentleman’s wash- 
ing ; it’d be no throuble in life, while I saw his beautiful, 
curly head peeping up from under the blankets, wid my own 


231 


Nurses for the Children of the Poor . 

two spalpeens on each side, to keep the darlint from falling 
out of bed, ye know. I’d always manage to get him a sup 
of new milk, yer honor, and ’d never put in a taste of water, 
as I do — an’ little blame to me — wid the others.” 

Again Mary Margaret paused; she had no other argu- 
ments to offer, and her poor, kind heart swelled painfully, 
when she saw no symptom of yielding in the face of the 
official. 

“ I cannot, indeed, Mrs. Dillon. It is out of my power ; 
the child must not remain entirely with you ; with so many 
children of your own, it would be impossible for you to bring 
him up as he should be ; your husband ought not to permit 
this injudicious kindness.” 

Poor Mary Margaret had nothing to answer. She knew 
well enough her husband, a hard-working man, had trouble 
enough to supply the clamorous wants of his own children, 
and that little Eddie, with his beauty and his sweet ways, 
had never been taught to rough it at home with the rest. 
Besides, there was a more powerful argument still, — that 
inexorable officer. 

Mary Margaret looked down at the boy, and tears stole 
into her eyes, slowly blinding her to his wistful little face. 
She looked at the officer, clasping her hands and bending 
forward as if he had been the picture of a saint. 

“Would ye do it, if I’d just go down on me two bended 
knees to yer honor — would ye now?” 

“ I have no power,” answered the man abruptly, bending 
over the book of records that lay open before him, that the 
woman might not observe the moisture that crept into his 
eyes. “ I have no power,” he repeated again, abruptly, nay, 
almost with harshness, for he was afraid to trust himself 
longer with those two faces turned so imploringly upon him, 
compelled as he was to act by a rigid law. 

Mary Margaret stooped down, and lifting the child in her 
arms, drew a corner of her shawl over him. 


232 


Nurses for the Children of the Poor. 

“ Would yer honor let me keep him wid meself and the 
childer one more night then ? It may n’t come so hard to 
give him up, after we’ve had time to consider on it, and 
raisen it over wid de poor motherless orphan. If it was to 
go to heaven itself, we could n’t give the crathur up the 
night. Will ye let him go home wid me just lying agin on 
me own motherly breast, as ye see hira now ? It ’ll never 
be again,' an’ I ’ve nursed him like me own.” 

“Yes I” said the officer, kindly, glad to have a petition 
he could grant, “ yes, yes; take him along, and if you wish 
it, go with him yourself up to the Island. Then you can 
be satisfied how well he will be cared for in his new home.” 

“ Thank yer honor kindly. I ’ll do me best to be con- 
tent,” said the poor woman, wiping her eyes with a corner 
of her shawl, and folding it over the boy again. “Do ye 
think they ’ll bind him out, and put him to strangers en- 
tirely, yer honor ? ” 

“ No, no ! he is quite too young for that. It is more likely 
that some person may adopt him and make a gentleman of 
him.” 

“ He is a gintleman, every inch of him,” answered Mar- 
garet, giving the child an enthusiastic hug, while her ardent 
temperament caught fire at this prophecy of a grand fortune. 
“ It ’s meself that has been particular regarding his manners, 
never letting him run out in the sun or make dirt-pies, or 
pick up oyster-shells from the gutter, wid the common. See 
if he isn’t white an’ clane as a dove — the crathur — neck 
an’ all, wid reverence to ye.” 

Here Mary Margaret jerked down the little fellow’s calico 
frock in front, exhibiting a plump, snowy neck, softly flushed 
like a shell that has just left the water, and a pair of dim- 
pled shoulders, from which the short sleeves were gathered 
up by bows of faded pink ribbon. 

“Wouldn’t any gintleman be proud of the like of that 
for a child of his own, now?” she continued, uttering her 


233 


Nurses for the Children of the Poor. 

vords between the kisses that she lavished on the white neck 
and shoulders, leaving a flush with every touch. “ Thank 
ye, kindly, for giving him to me and the childer for one 
night more; it’s like sending a lost bird to its nest agin. 
God’s blessings on ye ! ” 

Thus, half in tears, and half grateful, Mrs. Dillon made 
her way through the ' hungry crowd, that even in its 
misery cast admiring glances after the child, and walked 
homeward. Striving to reconcile herself to the inevitable 
with resolute philosophy, but with a swell of grief at heart, 
which threatened every moment to break into a deluge 
of tears, she presented little Edward to his foster-brothers 
and playfellows once more. She informed them, a little 
crossly, for her true sorrow would break forth in some shape, 
that it was only for a night, and after that Eddie would be 
made a gintleman of entirely, and that “ if he was going up 
among the common childer, it was only for convanience like, 
and after a while would be traiting ’em all with great civility, 
and bowing to ’em from his carriage-windy.” 

Her young brood took this information rather shyly, and 
Terry, who had been like a twin-brother to the little orphan, 
rebelled at once, vociferously protesting that he would go 
with Eddie and be a gintleman, too. But at length young 
Ireland was consoled with a promise, that perhaps he might 
yet ride behind the carriage which Eddie was undoubtedly 
to occupy, while the dear little fellow himself underwent 
a world of caresses, and was hushed to sleep with many a 
smothered sob. 


234 


The Adopted Son. 


CHAPTER XLII. 

THE ADOPTED SON. 

rpHE next day Mrs. Dillon stood at the ferry at RandelTs 
1 Island, looking wistfully back toward the spot where she 
had just left the ewe lamb of her flock. Her face was red with 
weeping, and from time to time she lifted up a corner of 
her shawl and wiped the drops from her eyes. Little Terry 
set up a pathetic howl, as the boat which had brought them 
over put back on its return voyage. Mary Margaret had 
no heart to chide him, but turned sorrowfully away, grieved 
to the soul as few mothers would have been. 

And there sat poor little Edward where he had been left, 
like a lost babe in all that wilderness of young life; all 
alone, and yet surrounded by so many. The very size of 
the nursery building terrified him. The crowd of strange 
faces hushed his grief into dumb silence. The nurses seemed 
like enemies that intended him some bodily harm, and from 
whom he would run away the moment their backs were 
turned. 

The child looked up to impart these thoughts to his foster- 
mother, and she was gone. He searched wildly around ; 
his innocent eyes grew large with affright ; his mouth and 
chin began to quiver ; and his poor little hands were pressed 
hard down upon the bench where they had seated him. 
That baby-struggle was a pitiful thing to witness. That 
tiny form, taking up its first battle of life, with no weapons 
but its terror and its tears, was touching beyond description. 

When he saw that she was gone, and that he was quite 
alone in that forest of human beings, the wild eyes began 
to fill, his face flushed, and sobs of home-sick anguish heaved 
his chest. A group of little orphans, who had learned to 
keep their sorrows in silence, cast shy glances at him from 


235 


The Adopted Son . 

the benches ; while he, with a child’s instincts, looked wist- 
fully at them through his tears, expecting the sympathy 
which they felt but could not express. 

A nurse came toward him filled with kindly interest, and 
in her motherly way strove to soothe him. 

“What is the matter, little one? don’t take on so!” she 
said ; “ don’t cry, that ’s a dear.” 

“ Mammy, mammy ! I want mammy ! ” pleaded the child, 
stretching out his little arms, but folding them over his 
face, and turning his back as she would have taken him up. 

The nurse had many other cares, and left him to his 
grief. When she came back again, he was gazing out through 
the window with heavy eyes, and a look so heartbroken 
that she made fresh effort to console him. 

It would not do. The child only asked for his mammy, 
answering everything with the same pleading look, and the 
same home-sick cry. 

At night, when stretched upon the straw bed in the in- 
fant’s dormitory, with a strange child resting on the same 
pillow, still and orderly, with its sorrows hushed down into 
a dreary content, little Edward lay sobbing in the stillness. 
The presence of so many children, filling the room with the 
monotonous breath of their slumber, frightened away sleep. 

The moonlight, as it stole in through the windows, re- 
vealing the range of cots with the pale forms upon them in 
fitful gleams, made him think but the more yearningly of 
home. Everything was cold, purely clean, yet full of des- 
olation to the child. He dared not cry ; the stillness and 
expanse of the room — vast compared to Dillon’s cabin — 
held him in awe. Vague ideas of something strange that 
v r as to happen, made his eyes gleam out large and wildly 
in the moonlight. There he lay, that poor, wakeful child, 
holding his breath, and swallowing his sobs in vague terror 
of the very life with which he was surrounded. Then the 
stillness was broken by rattling sounds in the wall, and the 


236 


The Adopted Son. 

patter of tiny feet along the floor. The rats, which haunt 
all public buildings impudently, as if they possessed an 
elective right to municipal plunder, were out on a midnight 
revel in the ceiling, and commenced chasing each other 
across the spotless floor. 

Poor little Eddie heard the sound with a thrill of terror. 
His limbs shook, a low cry broke from his lips, and creeping 
forward he clung, shivering, to the other little child, more 
fortunate in its power to sleep, that lay in the' same cot. 

But, no, the child was used to these noises and would not 
awake. With those trembling arms clinging to him in wild 
terror, and those brown curls, damp with tears, falling over 
his face, the child slept on, leaving the poor stranger more 
desolately alone from Ms slumbering presence. He had be- 
come used to the vastness and the midnight noises, and could 
not feel the baby-heart fluttering like a wounded bird against 
his side. 

And this night was a type of many that the boy spent in 
his new home. He would not be comforted ; his eyes were 
always heavy or filled with pitiful tears ; his little heart 
pined with a tender, yearning hunger for the friends who 
seemed hundreds of miles away. Grief was tenacious wfith 
him. His cheeks grew white as snow ; there was always a 
troubled quiver on his baby-lips if any one spoke to him ; 
but the noise of his sorrow was stilled, and so those who had 
charge said kindly to one another, — 

“Poor thing, it is the homesickness; he will soon get 
over it.” 

But weeks passed, and Eddie did not get over his home- 
sickness. He grew pale and quiet, but that sensitive baby- 
heart was desolate as ever. Visitors were, in those days, 
only admitted to the children once a month, consequently 
Mary Margaret did not see her child during these weeks of 
anguish. 

One day, when the little creature was becoming dreamily 


237 


The Adopted Son. 

passive, a strange gentleman and lady entered the baby’s 
nursery as they passed over the institution. They were both 
young and of singularly aristocratic appearance. Certainly 
there was nothing in the lady that reminded you of Mary 
Margaret Dillon, but the heart sometimes finds strange like- 
nesses. When Eddie looked up, the lady’s back was toward 
him. She was about the size of his nurse ; this must have 
been all, but it was enough. 

The child let himself dow T n from his seat and ran toward 
the lady, his bright eyes flashing, his hands extended, and 
his soft brown curls all afloat. 

“ Mammy, mammy, take me,” he cried, making ineffectual 
leaps to reach her arms. 

The lady turned her face — a beautiful face, in nothing 
like Mary Margaret’s, save that it was bright with kindly 
surprise. 

The child dropped his eager hands with a look of pitiful 
disappointment that touched her to the soul. 

“ Who is this ? ” she said, as the little creature crept, 
broken-hearted, back to hide himself among the other chil- 
dren. “ Tell me, what poor child is this that mistakes me for 
his mother ? ” 

She blushed as she spoke, and turned her eyes shyly from 
the look of half interest, half of amusement which her hus- 
band turned upon her. 

“ Come here, darling, let me talk with you,” she said, fol- 
lowing the child. “ Tell me your name.” 

She held out her arms, smiling, and with a glow upon her 
face, “ Come ! ” 

The boy glanced upward to her face. His eyes filled with 
light; his lips parted, and eying her with the shy look 
which we meet in a frightened rabbit, he held up his arms, 
laughing for the first time in weeks. 

The lady snatched him eagerly to her bosom. In an in- 
stant his arms wreathed themselves lovingly around her 
neck, and his cheek lay against hers. 


238 


The Adopted Son. 

“ Strange, is n’t it, that he should take to me so suddenly?” 
she said, pressing the pretty face closer to hers, and giving 
it a sidelong kiss. “ Is n’t he pretty? ” 

“Yes, and no?” answered the husband, laughing. “He 
would be a little heathen if he did not take to you ; and he 
is beautiful as one of Raphael's cherubs.” 

“And so loving,” rejoined the wife, with a pleading glance. 
“ What a pity to leave him here ! ” 

The husband looked gravely from the lady to the child. 
In his heart he thought her like one of Raphael’s Madonnas, 
only no painted child was ever so lovingly beautiful as the 
orphan she held. 

“ Could n’t we ? ” pleaded the lady, softly with her lips, 
most eloquently with her eyes. 

“It is a serious business,” answered the husband, still 
gravely, and with a sort of sadness. 

“ But we have none of our own, and our home is so large ?” 

The cloud deepened on her husband’s face. 

“ I know it,” he said ; “ this thought of adopting a child 
takes me painfully.” 

“ He looks like me enough to pass for ours,” said the lady, 
blushing scarlet as the words left her lips. “ I mean he has 
the same colored eyes and hair, and — and — ” 

“Yes,” thought the gentleman, “they are alike; it would 
be a pity to disturb the picture.” How pleadingly his eyes 
look out from under those curls, the same rich brown, with 
a gleam of gold in it. How came the little fellow so like 
my wife ? But he only said very seriously, “ Put him down, 
Mattie, we will talk it over at home ! ” 

The lady saw that he was in earnest, and attempted to 
unwind the child’s arms from her neck. But the little fel- 
low cried out, — 

“ No, no, mammy, mammy ! ” all in a tremor of affright 
clinging closer, and raining wild, sweet kisses upon her face. 

This was a kind of eloquence that neither the gentleman 


239 


The Adopted Son. 

nor lady could withstand. The homely but pathetic cry of 
“ mammy,” ran like a thrill of music through the youug 
woman’s heart. Her eyes swam in a tearful mist; her 
cheeks flushed with the hidden sweetness of a word never 
applied to her before. She had no power to force the child 
away, but drew him closer and closer to her bosom. 

“ Let me take him ! ” said the husband, with a troubled 
smile. 

He reached forth his arms. Eddie lifted his head and 
eyed him with a sidelong glance, while he loosened one arm 
from the lady’s neck, and clung closer with the other. 

“ Come, my little shaver, and see what I’ve got for you.” 

The boy bent slightly forward, and at length allowed 
himself to be taken, searching the gentleman’s face earnestly 
all the time. But when a motion was made as if to place 
him on the floor, the gentleman found his neck suddenly 
encircled by those two loving arms, and the little, tearful 
face was laid confidingly on his shoulder. 

“ Take me home — take me home,” pleaded the sweet 
voice. 

“ Could n’t we take him home and decide after ? ” pleaded 
the lady, with gentle feminine tacj, “ It will be a pleasant 
visit for the poor child, if nothing more.” 

“ He seems bent upon it,” answered the gentleman* laugh- 
ing, and rather pleased with this half measure. “ I think 
you could hardly get him from me yourself, Mattie.” 

The lady only laughed. She had no desire to weaken 
the effect already produced by the caressing helplessness of 
the little orphan, by claiming more than an equal share in 
his preference. 

“Well, then, let us go,” she said, in haste to have the 
child all to themselves. 

“ First, let us inquire about him. Perhaps he has parents 
or friends to interfere.* In that case, you know, it would be 
out of the question,” 


240 


Sitting by the Door . 

The young wife looked very grave at this, and the cloud 
of anxiety did not leave her face till it was ascertained at 
the superintendent’s office that Edward was an orphan, his 
father unknown, if living, and his mother’s death recorded 
in the hospital books at Bellevue. 

Thus accidentally, and almost from an affectionate caprice, 
this poor human waif was taken from his home in the nur- 
series ; and when Mary Margaret came with her eager love 
on the visiting-day, leading little Terry by the band — who 
was the bearer of a great orange for his foster-brother — the 
child was gone. 

This was a terrible blow to the good nurse. But when 
she heard that Eddie had gone off with an undoubted gen- 
tleman and lady, and that a splendid private carriage had 
waited for them at the ferry, she was, to an extent, consoled, 
though this was all the positive knowledge the laws of the 
institution allowed her to obtain. 

As for little Terry, he broke forth into a vociferous fit of 
crying, and for some minutes his plump and freckled cheeks 
were inundated with tears; but he, too, found a source of 
consolation in the big orange which now belonged entirely 
to himself, and which he devoured incontinently, skin and 
all, while seated on the wharf waiting a return of the ferry- 
boat which would convey himself and his mother back from 
their disappointing visit. 


CHAPTER XLIII. 

SITTING BY THE DOOR. 

A QUIET and most beautiful life was that which Cath- 
arine led, in her country home She was left com- 
pletely mistress of her own time, with those kind old people, 


241 


Sitting by the Door. 

who were always too happy when Elsie was alone with them- 
selves ; but with all the resources of enjoyment about her, 
a strange nervousness possessed the young woman. Not- 
withstanding the entire frankness of the old people, and the 
paternal interest with which they regarded her, there was a 
sort of dignified gentleness about them that forbade any 
allusion to the subject that haunted her thoughts continually. 

How came her husband’s portrait in that library, and 
what was the secret of its strange effect upon the demented 
daughter of the house? Why did it hang pendent with 
hers? 

Again and again these questions arose to the young 
woman’s lips ; but they always died upon them unuttered. 
The subject of this closed library was so completely ignored, 
it seemed so decidedly cast out from the routine of life among 
them, that she had no way of introducing it that would not 
seem forced and abrupt. 

Besides, a species of superstition seized upon her, regard- 
ing this apartment. Like most sensitive persons, wfio have 
suffered deeply, she shrunk from turning back to the painful 
points of her own experience; and blending these objects, as 
she necessarily must, with hei^own fate, the reserve which 
lay upon all the rest, fell like a mist over her also. This 
feeling grew with time, till she hoarded her own thoughts 
upon the subject as if they had been a sin. 

But she was drawn with irrepressible attraction toward 
the room. It was the only place on earth where she was 
certain of perfect solitude. No one ever visited that wing 
of the building, or at least ever penetrated so far as the 
library. The grass around the bay-window grew rank, and 
uncared for, while the lilac-trees and clustering roses re- 
mained leafy and unpruned from year to year, though per- 
fect order reigned everywhere else in the grounds. 

Early in the morning, before the family were astir, Cath- 
arine always spent an hour or two in the room so full of in- 
15 


242 


Sitting by the Door. 


terest, yet which every one seemed to shun. The picture of 
her husband upon the wall seemed like a living soul. It 
had brought back her faith in humanity. It had made her 
less alone in the world. 

A wonderful amount of knowledge may be accumulated, 
by devoting two morning hours out of the twenty-four to 
study, and, perhaps, the pleasantest acquirements we possess 
are those gathered up of our own free will, unaided and, as 
it were, in secret. 

Thus it was with Catharine. With a tolerable rudimental 
education she found no difficulty in a want of masters, and 
every day saw her naturally fine mind expand itself with 
freshly gathered ideas, that gradually consolidated and took 
the form of knowledge. 

Among other things she found a portfolio of drawings, 
rough studies, and bold, spirited sketches, such as genius 
throws off as it searches for perfect development, with im- 
plements and materials of art, which had long slumbered 
in disuse. The sight of these things awoke a new desire and 
a new talent in her. She would learn to paint. She would 
study hard, and so perfect herself, that some day his por- 
trait should be hers. She would work incessantly till her 
art should achieve a copy of%hat. This was all the result 
she thought of — his picture — nothing more. 

Here was an object for exertion. So she went to work, 
heart and soul, to obtain this shadow of a lost happiness ; 
looking dreamily toward the future when he might learn 
how faithfully she had worked and thought for him. 

It may injure Catharine, a deserted wife and childless 
mother, so young and so wronged, when I say that her life 
on the Island was one of tolerable happiness ; but she was 
not an angel of suffering, only an earnest, hopeful, young 
creature, resolved to perform her duties honestly as they 
arose. Spite of everything, she was looking forward to the 
possibility of meeting her husband in the future, to rejoice 


Sitting by the Door. 243 

over him if he was blameless, and to forgive him under any 
circumstances. 

Here again some of her own sex may condemn her for 
want of pride, and exclaim of what female dignity demands 
from the sex. But as I have said, Catharine was no heroine, 
only a beautiful, high-minded and gentle-hearted woman 
full of feminine compassion, not only for the miseries, but 
for the weaknesses of mankind. She never thought of her 
husband so much as having sinned against herself, individ- 
ually, as of the wrong done to his own manliness. 

People who have never loved can talk of that implacable 
dignity so regal in the proud woman ; but those who 
love know well that affection is stronger than pride, nay, 
stronger than death itself. (The woman who boasts that she 
w T ould be unforgiving to the man she loves, has very little 
of tenderness in her nature, or real dignity either. Never 
does the true Christian, or the true woman, which is much 
the same thing, appear more beautiful than with a feeling 
of charity warm at heart. The highest and purest charity 
is that which refuses to look with implacability on . the 
wrongs from which we have suffered. 

These gentle and forgiving feelings grew strong within 
the heart of the young woman, as she studied in that soli- 
tary room, solitary save for the pictured presence of her hus- 
band. Her character became fixed and noble, with the 
gradual expansion of a fine intellect, and it was not long 
before the frail, fair girl, so rich in all generous feeling, 
became deep-thoughted as she had hitherto been warm- 
hearted. 

For some time after her first discovery of the library, 
Catharine thought herself sure of solitude whenever she 
entered it. Once or twice she had heard soft footsteps creep- 
ing about the door, but after a moment’s attention forgot 
the circumstance. 

But one morning, while busy at her easel, working des- 


244 


Sitting by the Door. 

perately toward the one object — a copy of her husband’s 
portrait — she heard the heavy breathing of some object 
outside the door, followed by a suppressed murmur. 

Catharine arose suddenly, and opened the door, holding 
her palette and brush in one hand. There in the hall, with 
her long, flowing night-dress lying around her like a snow- 
drift, sat Elsie, her dark, wild eyes turned wistfully toward 
the library, as Eve might have been supposed to crouch at the 
gates of Eden. 

With a timid motion of the hand she beckoned Catharine 
toward her, uttering a low hush with her lips. 

Catharine stepped out and bent over her, as she was seated 
on the floor. 

“ Hush ! hist ! ” whispered Elsie, lifting her finger with a 
look of affright. “Is he there? are they together? does he 
suspect that I am here in the cold, waiting ? don’t tell him. 
I won’t come nearer, but it seems so hard to sit here all 
alone, and they in there. Please don’t tell them. Is he 
speaking to her ? Hoes she say anything about me? She 
should n’t, it ’s cruel. I carried off all the gray hairs, and 
the disgrace, and the heart-burn. They might let me stay 
here, you know.” 

The tone in which these words were uttered was so plead- 
ing and pitiful, the dark eyes, uplifted like those of a feverish 
child pleading for drink, had so much pathos in their glance, 
that Catharine felt tears trembling in her own voice, as she 
stooped down and endeavored to soothe the poor woman. 

“ Come in — come sit with me, Elsie dear. They will be 
glad to see you,” she said, humoring the idea that possessed 
her charge. 

Elsie shook her head. “ I could n’t — it sets my heart 
afire to see him looking so kindly at her, and so cruelly at 
me. But listen : I was more beautiful than she is, once, and 
he thought so — he did, indeed, but somehow — I don’t un- 
derstand how it was done — they made a division of God’s 


245 


Sitting by the Door . 

gifts, do you see. The beauty and love they left with her ; 
to me, they gave age and tears, sinfulness, disgrace, hemp- 
jackets, and told me to go alone and be still. The evil 
spirit had been driven out from between them. They called 
it Elsie. Yes, they gave me her name, and told me to be 
gone. That is the reason I sit here on the floor, so cold and 
gray, while she enjoys herself in there. Don’t tell them, 
for I like to stay !” 

“ Come back to your chamber, said Catharine, gently ; 
“ put on a nice dress, and we will go in together ; they will 
be very glad to see us ! ” 

“ Did they tell you so ? ” inquired Elsie, quickly. 

“ Yes, they told me so ! ” 

“ Did they ? — that was kind. But I can’t accept it, you 
know. When the people off yonder in the Bible sent their 
poor goat into the wilderness loaded down with their sins, 
he never came back to disgrace them, but lay down and 
died of hunger in the woods.” 

“ But you are not driven away — you are not alone or 
hungry ! ” 

“ Oh, yes, I am ! — here, here ! ” said the poor creature, 
pressing a hand to her side, and rocking back and forth as 
with pain ; “ but it don’t kill, this hunger. I starve and 
starve, but never die. Hush, they will hear me. Go back 
and shut the door. I like to sit just as I am; but don’t tell 
for anything.” 

Catharine hesitated, and made another effort to win the 
poor creature from her uncomfortable position. But Elsie 
was in a positive mood, and would neither go into the library 
or to her own room, though the morning was chilly, and her 
raiment so insufficient; nothing would urge her to move. 

“ I know — I know,” she said, impatiently, when Catharine 
urged this, “it is cold, it makes me shiver all over; but 
then you can guess how it is. I am to take all the cold, too, 
with the wakefulness and watching, it is a part of me this 


246 


The Italian Villa . 


cold ; when I tremble, they smile. Do you know I never 
smile : that is left to them ! ” 

“ Then,” said Catharine, gently, “ I will stay with you.” 
“No, no. The cold is catching, you will take it! ” 

“ But I must, unless you will go with me ! ” 

“ Not there,” pleaded Elsie, pointing to the library. 

“ No, to our room.” 

“ Well, if you are cold, I will go ! ” 

After that day, Catharine often found Elsie watching by 
the library-door, as she came out from her morning studies. 


CHAPTER XLIV. 

THE ITALIAN VILLA. 

W ITHIN sight of the library window, and down upon 
the sloping grounds that rolled in broken hollows to 
the sea, Catharine had noticed the building of a pretty 
Italian villa, that for a month or two of the spring had been 
throwing out some new w T ing or cornice through the tree3 
that weie to embower it. Even the workmen’s hammers 
could now and then be heard in the stillness of the morning, 
when nothing but the birds and those who toil for their 
daily bread are abroad. 

In a still life like hers, everything has its interest. From 
almost unconsciously watching the progress of such portions 
of the building as the irregularities of the ground made 
visible, Catharine began to wonder who this pretty residence 
was for, and how its inmates might hereafter affect her own 
singular life. It was the only dwelling in sight, and threat- 
ened to encroach somewhat upon the isolation of her home. 
Thus the subject became one of peculiar interest to her ; 
while the old people now and then wondered who was 


The Italian Villa. 


247 


building a house so near them, and if their close neighbor- 
hood to strangers might not interfere with the entire freedom 
which poor Elsie now enjoyed. 

Elsie herself heard the conversation regarding this new 
house, with wild attention. It seemed to startle her, and 
she murmured some vague comments as the others conversed, 
which betrayed a degree of unrest and excitement, that 
filled the good old people with fresh anxiety. 

At length, in the month of June, just when the roses 
were in their richest flush of beauty, the workmen seemed 
to have completed their task. No more sounds came on the 
wind to remind the family that human life was so near. 
The glaring freshness of unpainted wood was toned down 
into a warm, gray tint, scarcely visible beyond the tall elms 
and fruit thickets that covered the intervening grounds. 
From any effect it had upon Catharine’s life, the house might 
never have existed ; it was a pretty object in the distance, 
nothing more ; and yet it always gave her a faint pang when 
she looked that way. The same strange sensation occasioned 
by her husband’s picture seemed in some way associated 
with this house ; yet it was perfectly new, and had no pos- 
sible connection with her or hers more than the forest-trees 
that had supplied the timbers. 

One afternoon the family were all gathered in the com- 
mon sitting-room, loitering about the tea-table, till twilight 
stole on, and the air was heavy with falling dew. Elsie was 
sitting as usual at her mother’s feet, looking vaguely up to 
her face, and smiling that wan, hollow smile, that had neither 
intelligence nor warmth, and yet was so grateful to the gentle 
old mother. 

Mr. Ford had been dreamingly reading the religious 
paper, which brought his weekly allowance of literature; 
but as the golden dusk stole on, he laid the venerated sheet 
upon the table, and was serenely reflecting over its contents. 

Catharine sat by the window, restless, and with a vague 


248 


The Italian Villa . 


feeling of expectation, the more remarkable because no 
guests were ever invited to the lone dwelling, and because 
her reason told her that this impulsive feeling, that some 
one interested in her was coming, must be perfectly ground- 
less. Still she sat wistfully gazing out into the dusk. 
Every sound, if but the fluttering of a bird upon its nest, 
made her start. $he went forth in imagination into the 
world again, and mixed in the great drama of life, from 
which she had so long absented herself. 

As she sat thus, leaning upon the window-sill, there came 
up through the evening mist two figures, a lady and a child, 
moving onward softly like shadows gliding over the grass. 

Catharine held her breath and gazed upon them in silence. 
Were these the persons whom she had been unconsciously 
expecting ? Who were they ? And why did they creep so 
noiselessly across the sward ? 

The lady was in mourning, not the heavy black which 
shrouds the person as in a midnight of despair ; but her 
garments were of soft, pale gray, that floated around her 
like a mist, leaving her gentle face in relief, dim but beau- 
tiful. 

The child moved like a tropical bird beside his compan- 
ion ; his dress was of crimson, rich with the most delicate 
embroidery, that lay upon its borders like the plumage on 
the neck of a flamingo. The light was too dim for more 
than a general view of the strangers; but as they came 
slowly house ward, her heart beat fast, and she felt a sudden 
w r armth mount into her cheek, as if something kindred and 
pleasant were stirring her spirit to its depths. 

Impelled by a sudden impulse, at once urgent and unac- 
countable, the young woman arose and went out upon the 
front door-steps, as one who receives an expected guest. 

The lady and the child paused, — they had not intended 
to enter the house, but, lured on by the quietness and lovely 
glimpses of scenery that surrounded it, they had been led 
unconsciously in front. 


The Italian Villa. 


249 


“ Look, look, mamma. See that beautiful lady ! She is 
coming to speak with you ; come ! ” 

As the child spoke, he drew eagerly upon the hand which 
led him ; and Catharine, impelled by the same influence 
that had brought her to the door, descended the steps and 
met them. 

The lady smiled. 

“ My little boy is so delighted with the fruit-trees and 
flowers, that I cannot keep him off your grounds,” she said, 
mistaking Catharine for the mistress of the house. “ It is 
an intrusion, I fear?” 

Catharine did not answer. She was looking downward, 
with a sort of fascination, into the beautiful eyes of the boy, 
who neither smiled nor spoke, but returned her look so 
earnestly that his face grew sad, and he seemed ready to 
burst into tears. 

“We will retire at once!” said the lady, hurt by her 
silence; “I am sure it is an intrusion.” 

Catharine lifted her eyes from the child, and cast a wist- 
ful, inquiring glance upon the mother, as if the words of this 
excuse, so sweetly uttered, had fallen upon her ear, but not 
upon her sense. 

“ He is yours ! ” she said, with a strange smile ; “ dear 
soul, he is yours ! ” 

Again her eyes were turned on the boy, w T ho met them 
with a steady, earnest gaze, half tearful, half smiling. 

The young widow gave a troubled assent, and turning 
slowly, appeared about to retrace her steps. 

“ Do not go yet ! ” pleaded Catharine, catching her breath, 
and for the first time realizing her position and the strange- 
ness of her conduct. “ The grounds are pleasant always at 
sunset, ^nd so little disturbed, that you can find the charm 
of a wild wood almost in them. I should like to show you 
some of the finest views.” 

The lady smiled, and bent her head in acceptance of this 

kind offer. 


250 


The Strange Lady and her Child, 


CHAPTER XLV. 

THE STRANGE LADY AND HER CHILD. 

C ATHARINE reached out her hand. The little boy- 
looked up with a rosy smile, and gave his. 

“ Do you like to hunt bird’s-nests, and wade through the 
wet grass for peppermint, darling ? ” she inquired, taking the 
child’s hand, while her own began to tremble at the touch. 

“ I don’t know about the other, but birds, yes, yes, I love 
birds ; mamma has got, oh, so many, in a big cage at home,” 
answered the boy. 

“ He has not been much used to the country,” added the 
mother ; “ we only came to the Island last week, and our 
place is so new, that it scarcely can be called rural just now. 
These old trees and thickets make me almost dissatisfied 
with the barrenness of our home.” 

“Then you live in the new house yonder? I am glad of 
it. We are close neighbors. I have looked at your pretty 
villa from the window yonder, for months, wondering who 
would live in it. You will remain there, and this little boy 
— oh, how glad I am that he will stay in the neighborhood.” 

“ Thank you ; this is very kind, after our intrusion ; but 
your father must think it strange. We did not intend to 
come so near the house,” said the lady, glancing at the win- 
dow, at which a venerable head appeared, while Elsie was 
seen fluttering like an unquiet spirit in the dusk of the room 
beyond. 

“ Pie is not my father,” said Catharine, simply, “ only the 
person I live with. His daughter is ill; I am her friend, 
that is all.” 

“ The companion of a sick woman, and so young, so ” 


251 


The Strange Lady and her Child . 

The lady was about to have said “so beautiful,” but 
checked herself, blushing. 

“ It is a pleasant life,” said Catharine, “ and I am happy 
in it — merely to have a home is so much of itself.” 

“Yes, it must be a great blessing to those who have ever 
been homeless,” answered the lady, with a look of interest. 
“ It makes me shudder to think how desolate a poor young 
creature must be, cast upon the wide world. I have known 
beautiful, helpless women driven to the very almshouse from 
the want of a roof to shelter them.” 

A shudder passed over the lady as she spoke, and her eyes 
filled with trouble. 

“Yes,” said Catharine, with a degree of composure that 
had the dignity of experience in it, “I have seen these things 
— they do happen, but there, are troubles that make even 
the almshouse as nothing. A^Vhile we have one true heart 
to love us, it is shelter enough. To be unloved is perfect 
desolation.” ) u> -• u - 

A faint blush stole over the lady’s face, the flush of sup- 
pressed tears. She looked down at the child, and clasped 
his hand closer. 

“ We have lost our shelter,” she said. 

The boy’s face clouded. He understood that look of 
gentle grief too well. 

“He has no father, then?” inquired Catharine. 

“ No one but me in the wide world.” 

The boy took hold of his mother’s garments, and looked 
lovingly in her face. It was a pretty habit of dependence 
that he had learned while an infant, that of clinging to his 
mother’s skirts, and she loved him for it. 

These two women, complete strangers to each other, wan- 
dered slowly away from the house, talking quietly and sadly, 
like old friends that could afford to be natural ; but by de- 
grees Catharine became restless and slightly perturbed. 
There was something strange in this sudden confidence with 


252 


The Strange Lady and’ her Child. 

a stranger, that made her thoughtful. Familiar sounds in 
the voice, a sort of mesmeric atmosphere that had hung 
about her own childhood, came back. It seemed as if she 
had known this gentle widow years ago, and the wildness of 
the idea harassed her. The child, too — his eyes, the pretty 
curve of his red lips, the pure forehead, all were familiar ; 
she seemed to have kissed them a thousand times ; and it 
was with an effort of self-constraint that she kept from throw- 
ing her arms around him. 

This strangely familiar feeling was shared by the widow; 
while the boy gave his hand lovingly to Catharine, and 
walked by her side silent, but listening to all they said. 
But he became restless after a while, and looking up roguish- 
ly in Catharine’s face, lisped out — 

“You so pretty — what is ou’s name ? ” 

“My name is Catharine — Catharine Barr, my little man. 
Now tell me what yours is?” 

“ My name is Edward Oakley,” answered the child, “ and 
my papa has gone to heaven, he has.” 

Catharine started, and dropped the child’s hand. Mrs. 
Oakley was looking another way, and did not observe the 
change injier countenance, but the child saw it, and, think- 
ing that she was cross, hung back and began to search for 
amusement for himself, while the two women passed on, uncon- 
scious that he had deserted them ; for the name of Oakley had 
disturbed Catharine so much that she lost all self-possession. 
More than once she cast a long, searching look on the face 
of her companion, and each time became more and more 
satisfied that her intuition had been correct. She had 
known and loved that woman in her childhood. 

But little Edward had forgotten them both in the beauty 
of everything around him. The night was just setting in, 
balmy and clear. The dew was falling, and the grass 
sparkled with moisture beneath the glow of a full moon. 
The fire-flies scattered their tiny stars along the sward, and 


The Strange Lady and her Child. 253 

flashed in and out of the thickets with a brightness that 
dazzled the child. He sprang away, with his arms extend- 
ed, rushing on, and grasping at the grass with his little 
hands here and there, hoping to fill them with sparks. 

The ground was uneven and rolling where they stood ; a 
hickory-grove lay in the distance, and all along the slope of 
the hill were knolls covered with winter green and barberry 
thickets, in which the child soon lost himself. 

The fire-flies were constantly deluding him, flashing here 
and there, but never giving themselves to his grasp. He 
had outrun the voice of his mother, and the stillness fright- 
ened him. All at once as he stood listening, a whippoor- 
will began his night-plaint in the hickory-grove. The boy 
began to tremble as he heard it, the sound was so near a 
human lament, that it filled him alike with affright and 
compassion. Some one was in pain ; he was sure that wicked 
robbers were hurting some lady down in the woods. What 
could he do ? Where was his mother that she did not help 
the poor creature, whose lament fell so plaintively on the 
night? 

The child called aloud for his mother, who had gone wildly 
in an opposite direction in search of him ; and Catharine 
had blindly followed. Thus every instant increased the dis- 
tance that separated them. Each interval of silence filled 
him with fresh terror, and when the bird-wail came, his own 
wild cry for help rang with it to return upon him without 
answer. 

At last shriek after shriek rent the air ; but all in vain. 
Then he sunk to the ground. Lifting his eyes to the stars, 
and folding his hands palm to palm, he began to say his 
prayers. They were broken with sobs of grief, for it was 
difficult for the child to have faith in heaven, when his 
mother neglected to come. 

As he knelt upon the turf, sobbing out fragments of the 
Lord’s Prayer, a light tread came behind him, and he was 
lifted suddenly from the ground. 


254 


The Strange Lady and her Child . 

“ Mamma ! mamma ! ” he cried, joyously. 

But it was not mamma. It was a pale, dark face, that, 
lighted up with passionate joy, bent over him. The dark 
eyes, taking that strange brilliancy that nothing but moon- 
light can give, seemed burning their glances into his. The 
lips, all in motion, and agitated with broken murmurs, 
rained kisses upon his face, his arms, his hair, and even upon 
the folds of his dress. 

“ George! — Georgie, my own Georgie ! ” 

“No, no, not yours. I won’t, I won’t!” 

The little fellow struggled violently in the strange arms 
that had seized upon him, and his eyes grew wild and large 
with terror. But the female bore him on, whispering to 
herself, — ■ 

“ I have found him, I have found him. Let them take 
all the rest. He is mine, mine ! ” 

She raised her voice and sped on, shouting, “Mine, mine!” 
Her long, iron-gray hair had fallen loose, and floated out 
upon the wind ; a tragic joy sat upon her features, as the 
moonlight glanced over them ; and between her words she 
laughed a clear, gleeful laugh of defiance, which the whip- 
poorwill answered by his slow wail. 

The boy grew still. Something in the face of his captor 
fascinated him. The breath was checked upon his parted 
lips as she bore him along. 

As she approached the house, Elsie, for it was she, slack- 
ened her pace, and began to caress the child with a gentle 
sweetness that soon dispelled his terror. The words fell from 
her lips with a sort of charm. He began to wonder, rather 
than fear. 

“Hush, now hush, don’t speak a word, little Georgie; 
don’t breathe loud, that’s a dear. There, there ! ” 

She pressed his cheek to hers, whispering these cautions 
softly, and stole through the lilac and snow-ball thickets 
into the house. 


The Maniac and the Child . 


255 


She glided, with ghost-like stillness, through the hall, 
and through a long, dark passage, into the library. The 
shutters had been left open, and the room was filled with 
moonlight. It came through the bay window in a silvery 
flood, leaving but few shadows, and lying full and broad 
upon the two pictures. 

A great easy-chair stood in the centre of the room, and in 
this she placed the child, still holding both arms around 
him, while she crouched half upon her knees to the floor. 

“See, see! the boy comes willingly; he wishes to come; 
he loves me, and will stay forever and ever. Oh ! ha ! smile 
and smile ; you cannot get him away again ; he is mine, I 
tell you, all mine ! ” 

As she spoke, Elsie fell to caressing the boy, stilling his 
fears with the mesmerism of a strong though disturbed voli- 
tion, till at last he w T ound his arms about her neck, and fell 
asleep, with his head bent forward upon her bosom. 

Softly the poor, demented woman drew him down to her 
side upon the floor, and making a couch of the cushions 
which she took from the chair, she covered him with the 
great crimson shawl worn over her loose, white robe. 

Thus resting upon one elbow, and brooding over the child, 
as a thousand sweet feelings settled upon her face in the 
moonlight, she lay till daybreak, watchful and silent, tri- 
umphing in her soul over the two portraits that were to her 
human beings over whom she had attained a conquest. 


CHAPTER XL VI. 

THE MANIAC AND THE CHILD. 

M EANTIME the mother and Catharine had exhausted 
themselves in searching for the child. Mutual anxiety 
had drawn them together, as months of common acquaint- 


256 The Maniac and the Child. 

ance could not have done. When they returned to the 
house after midnight, in order to send the servants out to 
continue the search, they found the old people up, anfl in a 
state of painful excitement. Elsie, who had left them as 
they supposed, to go to her room, had mysteriously disap- 
peared. 

Here was a new source of alarm. Never before had 
Elsie been known to leave the house after dark. What 
could have led her forth ? And where had she fled to ? 

Again they all sallied out, the old people and the two 
young women, followed by the servants ; but all in vain. 
At daylight they returned home, weary and sorrowful, filled 
with dread that something fatal had happened to these 
helpless creatures, so loved and so strangely lost. 

At daylight a new thought stole upon Catharine. The 
library! Elsie might have concealed herself there, or 
might even be crouching near the door in the passage. She 
started up, ran along the passage, and flung open the library- 
door. 

There was Elsie, in the gray light of the morning, with 
one arm over the child, watching the pictures with her 
black, wakeful eyes, and with that triumphant smile still 
upon her lips. The red drapery, the beautiful head of the 
boy resting upon the cushions, and Elsie with those bright 
eyes and the iron-gray hair sweeping around her, formed a 
group that was more than picturesque. 

Catharine uttered a joyful cry, that brought the stranger 
and the two old people into the passage. The venerable 
parents ceased to weep as they approached the room, but a 
pallor came upon their faces, and they drew close together, 
as persons oppressed with a cold atmosphere strive to impart 
warmth each to the other. 

Elsie half arose, supporting herself with one hand pressed 
against the floor. 

“See, father — see, mother, I have got him. The night- 


The Maniac and the Child . 


257 


angel let him loose upon the moonbeams, then came to my 
room, whispering that he was alone searching for his mother 
and fleeing from one who was not his mother, but who had 
stolen the name and kept it, while we, who had his blood in 
our veins, were pining. 

“I listened to the night-angel, for he is grand and true, 
though since I came here he has almost forsaken me. I 
listened to the night-angel, when he told me that a child of 
my blood was uttering cries for help in the open fields; that 
the forest-birds were scaring him with their hooting cries ; 
and the woman who is not his mother was searching for him. 

“ The window was open, the grass underneath soft and 
silvered with moonshine. I flung out the folds of my shawl 
and stepped forth upon the air, sinking downward, but hold- 
ing out the red wings of my drapery as the angels do when 
they descend from heaven — but they would not hold me up, 
and I fell upon the grass, which bathed my face and hands 
with its silver dew. Still I heard the cry of my child afar 
off, and mocked by a miserable whippoorwill, that taunted 
his agonies of fear with long, mournful wails, that pained me 
to the soul. I have heard that whining bird before; he loves 
to mock at me and mine. Years ago he began it, years from 
now he will keep it up. 

“ My poor baby was there alone on the hillside, shrieking 
for me to come; I knew that the woman who is not his 
mother was after him heart and soul, as I was, the woman 
that is not his mother, who stands there ! ” 

Here Elsie half started from the floor, and pointed her 
finger at the poor young widow, who began to tremble and 
turned white beneath the gleam of those wild black eyes. 

“ Go home ! ” continued Elsie, with a look of sudden af- 
fright ; “ he is mine, God gave him to me first, and when he 
was lost the night-angel brought him back to me. You are 
not his mother! It is my blood that reddens his cheek, my 
breath that heaves his bosom, my soul that looks through 
16 


258 The Maniac and the Child. 

his eyes. Go home, the boy is mine, — mine, I tell you, 
mine ! ” 

Elsie almost shrieked these words out, in her eagerness 
to drive the pale young widow away ; and she bent over the 
child fiercely as an eagle broods over its young. 

The widow drew timidly forward, with her eyes, full of 
crushed tears, bent upon the child. 

“ Go home ! ” commanded Elsie, in wrath. “ Go home ! 
You are not his mother ! ” 

“But I love him. He is mine. He never knew any 
mother but me,” pleaded the young woman, while the tears 
started in large drops from her eyes, and her hands clasped 
themselves as if eager to implore silence and mercy from the 
maniac. 

“ Ho,” answered Elsie, and her black eyes kindled with 
fiery light to their depths; “no, he is mine. When the 
blood reaches his heart, mine beats quicker ; when it stops, 
I shall perish ; he is my soul, lost years and years ago, 
which the night-angel has brought back. Go away, go away ! ” 

The poor young woman looked around for some one to aid 
or comfort her. Catharine came forward. 

“Yes,” she said, gently, “the night-angel knows that Elsie 
is the child’s mother ; but he is so young and must be cared 
for. This is his nurse, who has taken charge of him for 
you. It is she who told the night-angel when he was ready 
to come back.” 

“ Oh ! are you sure ? ” questioned Elsie. “ She does not 
claim to be his mother ? ” 

“ Ho, only his mamma. You don’t mind what he calls 
her, if it is not mother.” 

“ You are sure, quite sure ? ” 

“ Quite sure. Wake him and see if he calls her any- 
thing but mamma.” 

Elsie smiled. “Wake him, oh, yes, I know how!” She 
bent her pale lips down to the rosy mouth of the child, leaving 
a timid kiss upon it. 


Three Hearts go out to Little Eddie . 259 

“ it makes my heart beat,” she said, drawing* a deep 
breath, and glancing furtively up at the portraits. “ They 
are jealous. Yes, they know what it is to be jealous now.” 


CHAPTER XLVII. 

THREE HEARTS GO OUT TO LITTLE EDDIE. 

E DDIE only turned his beautiful head on the cushion, 
and went to sleep again, with soft murmurs and a 
deeper breath. 

“ Shall I kiss him once more ? ” inquired Elsie, lifting her 
large, pleading eyes to Catharine. “You don’t think it 
troubles him ? ” 

“ No, he will awake next time.” 

Elsie bent down and pressed her lips like a burning seal 
upon the child’s forehead, which flushed crimson beneath 
the pressure. He awoke with a faint struggle, and starting 
up, began to rub his eyes with both hands. 

“ Edward — Eddie ! ” exclaimed the widow. 

The child scrambled up from the cushions as if to run 
toward her. 

“ Mamma, my own mamma ! ” 

Elsie’s face darkened like a thunder-cloud ; her pale lips 
began to quiver, and she made a dart forward with her 
hand. 

The child shrunk back on the cushions, frightened. 
Catharine bent over Elsie, smiling. 

“ You see the child does not call her mother! ” 

“Don’t he? .No; that is true; she is only the nurse. 
Take him away, he must have a bath, you know ; nurse, you 
will see to it.” 


260 Three Hearts go out to Little Eddie . 

Even as Elsie said this, however, the strength went out 
from her limbs, a delicious shiver ran through her whole 
frame, and as if the breath inhaled from those rosy lips 
had been a sweet poison, she breathed a sigh, and her head 
sunk slowly to the floor. Her hands dropped loose from 
the child, and she lay among the billowy folds of her white 
robe and crimson shawl, pale as snow, but with a smile of 
ineffable joy upon her face. The draught of life she had 
drank from those warm, half-parted lips was stealing like 
an elixir through her veins. 

“ Let us take the child away now ! ” said Catharine, stoop- 
ing gently down and lifting the boy from the cushions, 
where Elsie’s helplessness had left him. 

“ God bless the dear little fellow, he has made her smile,” 
said the old man, looking from Edward to the white face of 
his daughter, while his features, usually so placid, quivered 
with a rush of affection. “ Look at her, mother. When 
did she smile so naturally before? ” 

“ But how white she is,” said the dear, old lady, full of 
tender anxiety ; “ if it were not for the smile, it would seem 
like death ! ” 

“ But the smile, look at it ! Since the day we saw that 
face under its wedding-veil, white as it is now, but so happy, 
she has never looked like that,” said the old man. 

“But what if it were death?” answered the old lady, 
constantly rendered anxious by any change that fell upon 
her daughter, who, spite of her sorrow and gray hair, always 
seemed a child to her. “ I have heard that those who suf- 
fer most on earth often look happy as angels the moment 
they cease to breathe. Tell me, husband, tell me,” she con- 
tinued, clasping her hands with sudden affright, “is this 
sleep or death ? ” 

“Neither,” said Catharine, who had resigned the boy to 
his mother, and was kneeling beside Elsie. “ She is insen- 
sible, that is all ; a little effort will bring he* to.” 


Three Hearts go out to Little Eddie . 261 

“ Not yet — oh ! not yet,” cried the old lady, with tears 
in her eyes, drawing timidly toward the prostrate woman. 
“ Let me kiss her while she looks so natural. Husband, 
come ! ” 

She fell upon her knees, holding up her arms for the .old 
gentleman, who knelt beside her ; and the blended tears fell 
warm and fast on the poor maniac. First one and then the 
other bent forward, pressing timid kisses upon that pale face, 
thus assuring themselves that it still retained a glow of 
life. 

Meantime Catharine drew her visitor aside. “ Take the 
boy away,” she said, hui'riedly, “ she will not miss him, per- 
haps, if he is out of sight. But let me come and see him 
sometimes ; I will not trouble you often.” 

“I would leave him with you, if it would do her good, 
that is for an hour or two,” said the lady, who was trem- 
bling still with the joy of having found her darling. 

Catharine looked at the sleeping boy, with a keen desire 
to have him with her a few hours longer ; but a habit of 
self-control, which suffering had matured, enabled her at 
once to suppress the wish.^ 

“ No,” she answered, “ it would do no good, unless she had 
him always with her. It is a wild fancy that may not re- 
turn while he is out of sight ; besides, you look weary. Up 
all night, and so anxious.” 

“ I will go then, if you think it best,” answered the widow, 
with an effort ; and she moved away with the child. 

“ One moment ! ” pleaded Catharine, for her heart sunk 
as she saw the boy carried off “If you will sit down in 
the breakfast-room a moment, while I take care of poor 
Elsie, perhaps you will permit me to help you carry him 
home. I should be so happy, and you are worn out ! ” 

“ He is heavy,” answered the widow, “ but that is nothing. 
I am so glad to get him in my arms again. I could carry 
him over the whole world without feeling the w T eight.’ 


262 The Image in the Glass. 

“ I should like to carry him,” said Catharine, gently, “ if 
you were willing.” 

“ I will wait, of course I will wait. He is heavy, and I 
am almost tired out, as you say. It is very kind of you ; I 
will wait! ” 

The widow saw how anxious Catharine was, and with 
gentle tact gave way to her wishes. 

They hurried into the breakfast-room together, and after 
Catharine had arranged the cushions and white dainty couch 
for the child to rest on, she returned to the library. 


CHAPTER XLVIII. 

THE IMAGE IN THE GLASS. 

E LSIE had partially recovered. Her eyes were open, and 
she was resting on her elbow, looking with childlike 
■wonder around the room ; while the dear old people stood 
hand-in-hand, regarding her through a mist of grateful tears. 

“ How did I come here ? ” said Elsie, in her sweet, natural 
voice, that made those two fond hearts leap in unison ; “ I 
must have studied late, and fallen asleep after. Hid he miss 
me?” 

The old people looked at each other in alarm. 

“Of whom does she speak?” inquired Catharine. 

“ Of him,” answered the old man, glancing toward the 
portrait. “ What can we answer ? ” 

“He did not reach home last night,” said Catharine, 
gently. 

“ And who is this ? ” inquired Elsie, bending her brows, 
“ who knows of my husband’s movements better than I do 
myself? Send that woman from the house, father. The 
last one, you remember the last one ! ” 


The Image in the Glass. 263 

“ Elsie, do you not know me? ” inquired Catharine, aston- 
ished. 

“ How should I ? ” was the terse answer. “ What am I to 
you?” 

“ I am your friend ! ” 

Elsie laughed softly. “ I never had but one friend, and 
she ” 

“ Well, never mind her, darling,” interposed the old lady, 
anxiously. 

Elsie cast a scrutinizing glance at the old lady, and a look 
of profound astonishment came to her face. 

“ Why, mother, how strange you look! How old you are ! 
Dear me, your hair has grown so white ; and that queer cap. 
This will never do, mother.” 

“ My child — my dear child ! ” 

Elsie laughed, and shook her head. 

“Don’t plead. Don’t attempt to persuade me, mother. 
You must always dress like a gentlewoman. That hair and 
cap are frightful. Remember how much he thinks of these 
things.” 

The old people remained silent. This was a phase of mad- 
ness that they had never witnessed before. Catharine, too, 
was puzzled. Elsie seemed struggling with some old re- 
membrance, or rather to have cast herself back into a far- 
off scene of action, forgetting everything else ; and the young 
woman could only look on, waiting for opportunity to act. 

Elsie spoke again. 

“But while I am scolding you, mamma, I had forgotten 
to look at myself, in this robe so disordered, and my hair all 
down. What will he think of me?” 

As she spoke, Elsie moved toward a small mirror, set into 
the door of a cabinet, with which she seemed familiar. 

“ Why, how is this?” she cried, with astonishment, as the 
reflection of her figure came back from the glass ; and hold- 
ing out her long hair at arm’s length, she allowed the gray 


264 The Image in the Glass. 

tresses to drop slowly from her figure, repeating the question 
sharply, “ what is this ? whose hair is this ? ” 

No one answered her, and she stood gazing upon herself 
in wild amazement, turning her dark eyes upon her parents 
with a stern, questioning air, as if they had transfigured her. 

“ I cannot make it out,” she said at last, dropping her 
arms sadly downward ; “ I cannot make it out.’’ 

“ It is remembrance. It is a return of sanity ! ” whispered 
Catharine. “ Her recollection of what she has been, her for- 
getfulness of me — it is a hopeful sign.” 

The old people began to tremble. Their withered hands 
clung together, shaking like autumn-leaves ; low murmurs 
broke from their lips, but no words were uttered. They 
listened in breathless suspense for the next sentence that 
might fall from those troubled lips. 

“I wonder — I wish some one would tell me what it 
means,” she continued, looking wistfully in the glass. “ How 
am I to get these lines from my forehead, these, these ” 

She checked herself suddenly, gasping for breath. Her 
eyes were fixed wildly on the mirror as if she had seen a 
basilisk there ; her white lips began to tremble ; and uttering 
a low cry, she dashed her clenched hand against the glass, 
shivering it to a thousand fragments. 

“ I have done it — I have done it ! ” she cried, with an in- 
sane glare of the eyes, as she held out her clenched hand, all 
crimson with drops of blood, for them to look upon. “She 
crossed my path once, twice, again ! She looks like a witch 
now; but it ’s her — I know her! I have crushed her, do 
you see ? ” 

As she cried out in this exultant fashion, Elsie’s glance 
fell upon the bay-window, and instantly the breath was 
hushed on her lips. 

“There, there,” she cried, “I killed her, but she is there 
yet!” 

They followed her eyes, and there, close by the old-fash- 


The Image in the Glass. 265 

ioned bay-window, peering into the room, stood a strange 
woman, gaunt and witchlike, both in face and figure. Her 
sharp, wizen face was buried in a huge bonnet, which might 
have been in fashion twenty years before ; and her soiled, 
even ragged, dress, was partially concealed by a shawl cov- 
ered with a glowing pattern of red, green, orange, and blue, 
which was, possibly, in vogue at the time the bonnet was made. 
Still, both these articles seemed unworn till now. • The blond 
and flowers on the bonnet were yellow and faded with time, 
not by use. Her shawl had evidently just been shaken out 
of its original folds. But for these articles of finery, her 
appearance would have been that of a beggar. It was now 
merely fantastic ; for her gaiter-boots were not mates — one 
was buttoned, and the other laced with a bit of strong twine. 
She wore no stockings ; and the fingers of one hand pro- 
truded through a soiled cotton glove, while the other was 
concealed under her shawl, evidently lacking a mate. 

This fantastic figure stood close by the window, peering 
through with her keen, black eyes, that had the sharp glit- 
ter of a rattlesnake in them. But for this keen intelligence, 
she might have been taken for a common vagrant, on whom 
some kind old woman had bestowed charity from her hoard 
of old-fashioned garments. Instantly a cry broke from 
Catharine also, while the good old couple looked at each 
other in dismay. 

No one spoke, but all remained paralyzed, white as death 
and gazing at each other. Catharine, usually so self-pos- 
sessed* shook like an aspen, and Elsie crept to her side, seiz- 
ing upon her garments for protection, a sure sign that her 
insanity, for a moment put off, had returned again, more 
fiercely than ever. 

The strange creature at the window seemed rather amused 
by the consternation she had produced. Her face wrinkled 
into a laugh, and the glitter of her eyes seemed to strike 
fire upon the glass. After indulging herself a moment or two, 
she turned away, walking deliberately toward the front door. 


266 


Enemies Meeting. 


CHAPTER XLIX. 

ENEMIES MEETING. 

T HE young widow still remained in the breakfast-room, 
sitting by the little boy, who slept peacefully upon a 
sofa. As she looked up from the beautiful face, so warm 
and rosy with sleep, her eyes fell upon this singular woman, 
who stood within the hall, looking keenly at her from the 
shelter of her huge, old-fashioned bonnet. 

The impression made upon this young woman was quite 
unlike that left upon the group in the library. A look of 
profound surprise, not unmingled with amusement at the 
strange figure which presented itself, came over her face, for 
she had recovered her child and was disposed to cheerful 
thoughts. 

.. “ The people are all in another part of the house,” she 
said, pleasantly, “ but here is a trifle, if you require help.” 

The woman came forward, with a chuckle, and seized upon 
the piece of silver so kindly offered. 

“Ha, ha — I am rolling in gold, rolling in it, do you see. 
But as for help, the more one has, the more one wants help. 
I have a cat and three chickens at home, that ’ll be the bet- 
ter for what you give them. As for me, I can make my bed 
of gold and feel it soft. Oh ! ha, that ’s a pretty boy you ’ve 
got there.” 

The young mother was gratified. The woman before her 
became less grotesque. Maternal love was beginning to 
soften even her evil exterior. 

“ Yes,” said the gentle matron, “ he is a darling. If you 
could but see his eyes now. Wait a moment. He stirs!” 

“Ah ! I can wait to see his eyes, dear little rogue. How 
white his forehead is ! What curls, brown as a chestnut, 


267 


Enemies Meeting. 

with a touch of gold in it. Ah, there lies the beauty. Gold, 
gold, I should like to see it everywhere.” 

As she spoke, the old woman crept close to the sofa, and 
began to lift the curls, which lay on the child’s temple, with 
her claw-like fingers. 

As she did this, the widow, who was looking on rather 
anxiously, for she recoiled from the sight of those hooked 
finger-nails so close to the snowy forehead of her clyld, saw 
for the first time what looked like the shadow of a ruby 
cross upon the boy’s temple, the top running up among the 
curls, which, strangely enough, did not grow upon the spot, 
but only sheltered it from casual scrutiny. 

“ It is the mark of his fingers. He always sleeps with 
his hand under his head,” observed the widow, with a vague 
feeling of awe. “ His skin is so delicate, the touch of a 
rose-leaf makes it flush.” 

“ Pretty though, is n’t it ? ” said the old woman, with a 
sharp laugh. 

“Everything about him is beautiful to me,” said the 
young woman, gazing fondly on the child. 

“Eddie, my darling — has he slept enough?” 

The little fellow, fully aroused at last from his sweet slum- 
ber, turned upon his cushion and began to rub both little 
fists into his eyes, while his lips parted like the sudden un- 
folding of a rose-bud. 

“ Mamma ! ” 

The little fellow rose to a sitting posture and held out his 
arms. 

“ My darling ! ” 

“Hear little fellow. Never mind, come to aunty,” inter- 
posed the strange woman, reaching forth her arms, that fell 
around the child like a pair of flails. 

The boy struggled and wrung himself free from this un- 
welcome embrace. 

“ Let me alone,” he said, clenching his tiny fist, and stamp- 


268 


Enemies Meeting . 


ing fiercely upon the sofa-cushion, “I don’t want beggar- 
women to touch me ! ” 

“ Beggar ! ” cried the woman, with a shrill laugh. “Ah! 
that’s a nice joke, my darling. Beggar! I ’ve half a mind 
to shake you where you stand. Beggar ! Oh ! it ’s a sweet 
child. Of course it ’s your own, ma’am ? ” 

This question was put with startling abruptness, accom- 
panied by a sharp, scrutinizing glance, that drove the blood 
from the fair cheek it searched. 

“Mine, of course. Yes, of course,” faltered the lady, 
drawing the boy toward her with both arms. “ Mine, yes, 
yes, whose else? What do you mean, woman?” • 

Her voice was sharp with anxiety. Her soft eyes turned 
a startled gaze on that grim face, which looked to her like 
that of a fiend. 

“ Oh ! of course, why not ? he looks like you, don’t he ? 
Of course, who doubts it ? ” mocked the woman. 

“Go away, go a way^- beggar-woman,” cried the child, 
clinging to his mother’s neck with one arm, and clenching 
his right hand with puny courage. “ Don’t look at my 
mamma so. Don’t speak to her. Go away, or I’ll, I’ll — yes, 
I will — so there now ! ” 

Here the little hero burst into tears, and hid his face 
upon his mother’s shoulder. 

“ What do you want, woman ? ” inquired the young ma- 
tron, rising with the boy in her arms. “ If you wish to see 
the gentleman of the house, he is engaged. I do not live 
here. Let me pass.” 

“Let me have another look at the darling, just a peep 
into his eyes, I’m so fond of children,” said the woman, with 
wheedling softness, that was far more disgusting than her 
rudeness had been. “ I want him to know me, bless his 
pretty face ! ” 

“ Let me pass ! ” insisted the widow, beginning to feel ter- 
rified, “ I do not wish him to look at you.” 


269 


Enemies Meeting. 

“ Oh ! that’s cruel now, and the boy so like his father ! ” 

“ So like his father ! Did you know him, then ? ” 

“ I did not know your husband ; but I did know this 
child’s father,” was the answer. • 

“ No! you did not — you could not. The thing is quite 
impossible. No one ever knew him.” 

The old woman laughed. “ I must have another look,” 
she said, attempting to seize upon the child, w T ho uttered a 
sudden cry. 

Presently a form came leaping through the hall, uttering 
a shriek with every bound. Her hair streamed backward, 
her eyes blazed, her arms were outstretched. She rushed 
forward, like a bird of prey with its* spoil in sight. Her 
hands fell with a clutch upon that meagre woman, shaking 
her in every limb as they seized upon her shoulders. 

“ Ha ! ha ! I have found you at last,” cried she, “ touch 
him, touch him, oh ! touch him, and I’ll — ” 

Elsie paused a moment, and stealing both hands slowly 
from the shoulders to the throat of the old woman, clutched 
it, turning her head backward and saying to Catharine, 
“ May I ? shall I ? She has grown into a fiend ; let me choke 
her.” 

She pleaded for permission to kill that woman as a mother 
pleads for the life of a child. The insane lustre of her eyes 
grew brighter, her pale hands quivered eagerly about the 
lean throat upon which they had not yet firmly closed. 
She was pleading for permission to kill the woman as if she 
had been a serpent. 

Catharine came up, terrified but firm. Her clear blue 
eyes were fixed steadily on those of the maniac, her slender 
form erected itself into command. 

“ Come,” she said, “ leave this woman ; she belongs to 
God.” 

“ Why don’t he kill her then ? ” hissed the maniac, striving 
to evade Catharine’s glance. 


270 


Enemies Meeting. 


“Because he is, perhaps, punishing her with life.” 

“But it would be so pleasant to kill her! ” pleaded Elsie, 
“and I will. Nobody gives me any happiness. I will take 
it for myself.” 

Even in her peril, for it was imminent, the strange wo- 
man did not lose her craft. She managed to fix her eyes, 
cold and sharp as steel, upon the glittering orbs of her 
enemy. 

“ See, stoop down and I ’ll tell you something,” she said, 
in a voice that gave no evidence of the terror that shook 
her heart. 

Elsie looked down into the cold depths of her eyes, and 
her head bent slowly forward like a bird that is charmed to 
death. 

“ Of him ? Will you tell me ? ” she whispered. 

“ He wishes to see you. He sent me to ask if he might 
come. Let me go, and I will bring him.” 

“Where is he?” whispered Elsie. “ I heard him crying 
in the woods last night, crying out so mournfully ; but I 
knew the reason ; he had lost the child. Oh ! how one cries 
out who has lost a child ! But I found it. Ha ! ha ! I found 
it! and let him wail on. No wonder he complained all 
night, it is very lonesome to be without one’s child. Do you 
think he will moan every night till the boy goes back ? ” 

“ He will come and ask you to stay with him,” said the 
crafty wretch, drawing a deep breath as she felt the pale 
hands unclasp from her throat. 

“ But you will not go — you will stay here, or sail off over 
the sea’s away, away. Yes, yes, I will go down into the 
woods. Turn your face to the east and I will go westward. 
One, two graves shall be under the setting sun, canopied 
with clouds of crimson and amber and pale green, all float- 
ing, floating, floating. But you — you shall die alone, alone, 
alone ! ” 

Her hands dropped away from the trembling creature, 


A Visitor to Breakfast. 


271 


and were flung triumphantly upward. Her voice rose and 
swelled into a sort of chant, and as she passed through the 
hall, the words, “ Alone, alone, alone,” came back with a 
mournful emphasis that made even that bad woman turn 
pale. 


CHAPTER L. 

A VISITOR TO BREAKFAST. 

T HE old gentleman, who had regarded this scene in anx- 
ious silence, now moved forward and confronted his un- 
welcome visitor. 

“ Madam, this is your second visit here,” he said ; “ what 
new trouble is to fall upon us?” 

“He-he!” laughed the woman, hysterical with fright, 
“ I only came to inquire after the interesting young lady, 
who has made my neck burn with her fingers. Her wel- 
come was a warmer one than yours.” 

“What is your business here?” persisted the old man. 
“Nothing, nothing. I came down to the Island for 
amusement, and thought I’d just call and see how things 
went on in the old place. You don’t seem glad to see me. 
But I got used to that long ago. Nice little fellow, is n’t 
it?” 

She pointed her finger at Eddie, who, shrinking away as 
if from a basilisk, began to cry. 

The old man turned his eyes that way. In the confusion 
and anxieties of the morning, he had hardly looked on the 
child. Now the glance brought an entire change in his 
countenance. A faint color mounted to his forehead, and 
stepping forward, he took the boy suddenly from his mother. 

“ Don’t let her touch him. Oh ! don’t let her touch him ! ” 
pleaded the lady. 


272 


A Visitor to Breakfast. 


“ Not for the universe L” said the old man. “I know 
what her touch is to innocent things like this. Have no 
fear. She shall be driven hence, leper as she is.” 

“ Leper ! Ah ! that ’s a new name,” half snarled, half 
jeered the woman. “ I thought you had run yourself out 
abusing me. But this is something uncommon! Leper! 
that is a name in your Protestant Bible, I suppose.” 

“ If you have business here, speak ; if not, go out from 
under my roof; I cannot breathe /while it shelters you. Go, 
I say. You have driven my poor child mad again. The 
sight of you is worse than death to us all.” 

“Now this is hospitality, this is gratitude. Well, well, I 
am ready to go. Shall I carry the little boy for you, ma’am ? ” 

“ No,” replied the widow, breathless with apprehension ; 
“ give Edward to me, sir. I must return home. My people 
do not know that he is found.” 

“ Oh ! don’t be frightened. I a'n’t after your precious 
treasure. Keep him to yourself, for what I care. He is n’t 
mine a bit more than he’s yours, so we won’t quarrel about 
him.” 

The witch gave the strings of her bonnet a sharp jerk as 
she spoke, tied them in a hard knot under her chin, and 
fluttered from the room, leaving an unpleasant laugh float- 
ing behind. 

When she disappeared, moving downward to the water, 
the old man spoke again : 

“ I will carry the boy home for you. Don’t be frightened. 
She is a wicked woman, but her day is over ; she can insult 
nothing more !” 

“ Who is she ? ” inquired the widow, so anxiously that her 
question seemed abrupt. 

“ An evil woman, who has led an evil life,” he answered. 

“Do not mention her. Drive her from the house. I 
charge you, never let that woman enter the presence of my 
child again,” interposed the old lady, who entered the room 
that instant. 


273 


A Visitor to Breakfast 

“ She never shall, mother, she never shall,” answered the 
husband. “ Be pacified. She will not attempt to return.” 

“ She, who haunted my child into a madhouse, comes again 
like a fiend that will not be satisfied. Poor, poor Elsie, she 
will not speak to me. There she sits in a comer of her 
room, singing over that one word ‘ alone, alone/ Husband, 
husband, it is breaking my heart.” 

“ Be patient, wife. The woman has gone. Elsie will re- 
cover from this wild fit — do be patient! ” he replied, sooth- 
ingly. 

“ I will go to her. I will sit down by her side, and weep 
while she sings. I am old and weak. What else can I do 
•^but weep for my child.” 

The old lady went out, making this mournful plaint, and 
her husband, with a troubled face, and slow, sad step, bore 
little Edward homeward. As he walked, the good nfan be- 
came composed ; the little form pressed to his bosom gave 
bloom and life to his feelings ; a glow of enthusiasm stole 
through his veins ; and without knowing it, the old man 
grew strong in the young life given to his embrace. 

The widow walked thoughtfully by his side. Her brow 
was clouded, her look troubled. She glanced back now and 
then, apprehensive that the evil woman might follow her and 
the child. 

The house, which they entered, was a graceful contrast to 
the one they had left. Verandas of light iron work ran 
around one wing and across the front ; passion-flowers and 
other rare hot-house vines crept in and out through this net- 
work, like colored embroidery on a lace ground : the whole 
dwelling was light, cool, and exceedingly pleasant. The 
fragrance of cape jessamines and heliotrope stole out through 
this tangled veil of flowers ; and hid away among the vines 
were cages full of singing-birds, sending out gushes of song 
to greet the early morning. 

The old gentleman did not notice these things, but placed 
17 


274 A Visitor to Breakfast . 

tlie child gently upon his feet in the veranda, and turned 
away. His heart was full of apprehension regarding his 
daughter. The half-subdued madness had returned upon 
her, their old enemy had appeared again. The fear of long, 
long years was entirely broken up. Why should that wily 
serpent have crept into his Eden a second time? Filled' 
with these thoughts, the old man bade his neighbor a gentle 
good morning and went away. 

Mrs. Oakley entered her dwelling, weary, and filled with 
a vague terror by the scene she had witnessed. The night’s 
watch had left her garments in disarray. The dark-brown 
hair was partly unbraided, and fell in waves half-way to her 
shoulders ; her bonnet was pushed back, and her pale face 
stained with tears. 

A small breakfast-room opened upon the veranda, its 
French windows clouded with lace, and its adornments cool 
and simple. A breakfast-table had been spread in expecta- 
tion of her coming, and with its service of pure white china 
and frosted silver stood before these misty windows, through 
which a net-work of vines and blossoms was softly visible. 

A person, who sat in this room, saw Mrs. Oakley as she 
entered, and arose as if to go forth and meet her. But a 
glance at her pale face checked him, and seating himself, 
he saw her pass to her chamber. 

The gentleman sat alone some time, dreamily watching 
the humming-birds, as they flashed in and out through the 
blooming screen of flowers, shaking 'the dew in glittering 
drops upon the sunshine, and humming softly to the bells 
they robbed of honey. A smile was upon the stranger’s 
lips. He seemed waiting in tranquil mood for some antici- 
pated joy. At last Mrs. Oakley came in, leading her boy 
by the hand. A robe of spotted muslin had displaced her 
half-mourning dress, lilac ribbons knotted it together down 
the front and brightened the folds upon her bosom. Her 
beautiful tresses lay coiled in one heavy braid around her 


275 


A Visitor to Breakfast. 

head. Nothing could have been more simple than her ap- 
pearance. But her face was pale, and a look of fatigue 
hung upon it. 

She evidently expected to find the breakfast-room empty, 
and entered it with downcast eyes. An exclamation from 
the child, and a joyful leap forward, made her look up. A 
wave of crimson rushed over her face ; she smiled half 
gladly, half shyly, and held out her hand. 

“When did you come? Have you waited long?” she 
said. 

It was a commonplace welcome in words ; but her voice 
grew sweet with suppressed tenderness, as she uttered it. 

“ I have been waiting and dreaming here this half hour,” 
answered her guest, taking Eddie in his arms ; “ I did not 
expect to find you from home so early.” 

“ OE, it was Eddie’s fault, he ran away and was lost all 
night.” 

“ Lost ! how ? Where did you find him ? ” 

There was no reason why the young widow should not 
have answered this question. But there was a feeling of 
sadness connected with the scenes she had witnessed that 
night, which checked her, and she merely replied that a 
neighbor had found the boy and taken him home. 

“ And oh,” interposed Eddie, “ she was such a tall, black 
lady, with eyes all fire, and such hot lips.” 

“ Y ou did not like her then, my little man ? ” inquired the 
visitor. 

“ Yes, I did. She loved me, oh, so much. You don’t 
know how hard she kissed me, and hugged me till it stopped 
my breath. 

“I don’t wonder,” replied the stranger. “Who could 
help loving you dearly ? ” and his fine face flushed crimson, 
as he pressed a kiss on the rosy mouth of the child. 

“Come,” said Mrs. Oakley, blushing also, but smiling amid 
the pleasant confusion. “ We shall all have an appetite for 
breakfast.” 


276 


Out in the Storm. 


And with the timid bashfulness of a girl, she sat down 
to do the honors of her new home to one whose gaze she had 
learned to tremble under. 


CHAPTER LI. 


OUT IN THE STORM. 


HY did that miserable woman prowl, so cat-like and 



» V stealthily, around those two houses ? What motive 
„ could have brought her so far from home, a second Satan, 
to poison and blast the Eden of peace - and charity those two 
aged people had gathered around them ? What had they 
ever done, that she should persecute them so ruthlessly with 
her presence? 

They knew her, that was certain, for Catharine, even be- 
yond her own shuddering fear, had noticed that their limbs 
trembled beneath them as she approached, and that a deadly 
fear burned in their eyes and spoke in every line of their 
gentle faces. 

Elsie too. The very sight of this evil woman had driven 
her into fierce insanity again. Why was this ? Had they 
known her before? If so, how and where? The portrait 
of her husband, — was that, too, a mysterious link between 
these old people, so opposite in character, so unlikely to 
hold anything in common ? How was she connected with 
them all ? 

These conjectures kept Catharine awake half the night, 
while poor Elsie moaned and muttered in her sleep, or started 
up with wild cries, calling upon God to drive her enemies 
forth and not let them torment her forever ! 

Catharine left her bed, feverish and excited by these 
thoughts. She felt sure that Madame De Marke had not 


Out in the Storm . 


277 


recognized her ; for slie had been standing on one side in 
the library, when those evil eyes looked through the window. 
But the very sight of her old enemy left a nervous dread 
behind it, and she could not rest. Events of importance to 
her own destiny seemed to be crowding themselves around 
her, vaguely, it is true, but with a force that awoke a sort of 
terror in her. 

She opened her chamber-window and sat down. Elsie 
was moaning and muttering in her bed, agonized by sleeping 
terrors. The wind without rose high and blustering; clouds 
lowered down among the trees; and gusts of rain drifted 
through the leaves, bathing them, as it were, with liquid 
diamonds, through which the lightning shot from time to 
time, with its thousand golden arrows. 

Next to her chamber, the two old people lay awake. The 
sound of their conversation came to her ear at times through 
the pauses of the wind, like a softened and mournful echo 
of Elsie’s raving. 

Beneath her was the library, with its mysterious associa- 
tions. The trees around it loomed against the bank of 
clouds, disconnected from their blackness only by the light- 
ning that shot from it. All was gloom within and without ; 
and amid the storm, her sobs rose and swelled unheard and 
unfelt, save by her own lonely heart. 

The lightning grew stronger and enveloped the whole 
landscape in broad, lurid sheets, revealing the country 
around and a sombre expanse of water beyond. At these 
times the new cottage stood out in broad relief, and the 
whole space of ground between that and the old mansion- 
house was momentarily illuminated. The scene gave the 
young woman a fierce sort of exaltation, while it filled her 
with grief. She thought of her husband and longed to shout 
his name aloud, to ask him to come forth from the bosom of 
the storm and tell her that he was yet alive. 

While this excitement was upon her, a crash of thunder 


278 


Out in the Storm . 


broke over the house, and a rush of wind rent its way 
through the trees, scattering their foliage in torn masses 
from the boughs. Then came another fiery scroll, unfolding 
itself upon the wind, casting its blue radiance upon the 
earth, and kindling the sky with its forked light. 

The flash was so vivid and so prolonged that she started 
up with a cry of alarm. It was echoed by a shriek that cut 
sharper than steel through the noise of the storm. 

“ See, see,” cried Elsie, who now stood beside her, “ the 
lightning has got him ; call him back ; call him back, I 
say ! ” 

Her eyes flashed out their insane fire, lightning against 
lightning, both springing from darkness. The wind swept 
through her hair, filling it with rain-drops. The white folds 
of her garments and those flowing sleeves fluttered and 
shook about her like the wings of a spirit. Her clasped 
hands were extended over Catharine’s head into the storm. 
Elsie, aroused by the burst of thunder, had rushed from her 
sleep and stood before the window, daring the tempest as if 
she had been its spirit. 

“ Call him back ; he is mine. Call him back ! ” she 
shrieked. 

“ Great heaven ! what is this ? ” answered Catharine, pale 
with astonishment, for directly before her, passing, as it 
seemed, backward beneath the branches of the elm-tree, was 
her own husband. But while the words were on her lip, 
the lightning passed by ; and the man who had appeared 
before her for a single moment was engulfed in the dark- 
ness. 

It was an open casement by which they stood, just over 
the bay-window of the library. I have mentioned that an 
old forest- tree overshadowed this portion of the house, 
drooping its branches downward like a tent. As the dark- 
ness closed in upon them, Elsie leaped like a panther 
through the casement, lodged a moment on the bay-window, 


Out in the Storm . 


279 


and seizing a pendent branch, flung herself forward into the 
blackness of the storm. A sharp, long cry came back from 
the tempest in which Elsie seemed to have been engulfed. 

Catharine stood helpless with surprise and terror, strain- 
ing her eyes to discover a trace of the maniac. But Elsie 
had disappeared. A flash of lightning revealed her for an 
instant as she rushed through its gleams beneath the trees, 
giving her white garments and her long hair back to the 
blast ; then all was dark again. 

Trembling with affright, Catharine ran down stairs, seized 
a blanket-shawl, and went out in search of her charge. The 
storm still raged, but not so furiously as it had done — every- 
thing was wet through and through ; every leaf dripped rain, 
the grass was so wet that it seemed like wading through a 
swamp as she passed on. Her night-robe was soon soaked, 
and her bare feet chilled to marble, as they sunk in the 
cold grass. 

But she took no heed of this. Elsie had gone toward the 
water, and she was wild with fear that in her madness the 
maniac might plunge into the deep. 

Quick as the lightning that now and then revealed her 
way, she darted shoreward, calling out for Elsie as she 
went ; but terror and speed deprived her voice of all power, 
and she could utter the name of her charge in hoarse whis- 
pers only. 

As she passed by the cottage, a glare of lightning fell 
upon her, and through it she saw an open window lighted 
from within. That same man was framed in the open sash, 
whose apparition, a few minutes before, had drawn Elsie 
into the storm. 

Was it a real being? Or was it the picture which she 
had copied in the library ? The same proportions were there ; 
the coloring was alike; but this picture looked human. 
Was it her breathing husband ? Or had terror driven her 
mad also ? 


280 


Out in the Storm. 


She paused a moment, with her face uplifted, wondering 
if she were mad, or not ; if the vision were a hallucination 
or a reality. The rain beat into her uplifted face, the wind 
blew fiercely over her thinly clad form. No wonder she 
seemed ghost-like to the man who saw her from the window. 

A voice down toward the water aroused her from this 
wild trance. She turned and ran toward it, calling aloud. 
“ Elsie ! oh, Elsie ! ” 


CHAPTER LII. 

OUT IN THE STORM. 

A S Catharine approached the shore, Elsie came toward 
her, drifting, as it were, like a cloud before the storm. 
“ I have followed him, I caught him ; see here ! ” she 
cried, with great exultation; “see here! I have torn off her 
crown ; I have rent away her robe ; but they are both gone ; 
gone into the depths of the sea ; that is the way he treats 
me; always with her! always with her! and oh, oh! how 
like a fiend she has grown ; she was never handsome, never ; 
but I have disrobed and uncrowned her; see! see!” 

As she spoke, Elsie held up the crown of a bonnet, to 
which a trail of yellow lace was clinging, and a fragment of 
faded calico. How she had obtained them, Catharine could 
only conjecture; and she was now too much excited for 
thought on the subject. 

“Oh, Elsie! how you have frightened me; let us go 
home ! ” she pleaded, locking her arms with those of the 
lunatic. “ I am wet and cold. Do go home with me, Elsie ! ” 
“ Poor child, poor little dear ! Cold is it ! Elsie is always 
cold and wet too — wet with her own tears. You see the 
ocean yonder? it was a dry plain till I wept it full of sor- 


Out in the Storm . 


281 


row ; now, see how it heaves and foams, and laughs at 
the lightning ; all the moans lie at the bottom, for it does 
groan heavily at times. When she went into it, I could 
hear it sigh and heave and struggle as my heart did when 
the snake crept around it, tightening and tightening its 
coils till I was stifled with groans ; but the ocean has got 
her now ; I am glad that I gave the brave old ocean so many 
tears. They have drowned her at last ; I heard them gurgle 
in her throat. Oh ! it was music to hear the strangle. I 
wish you had heard it — I wish you had heard it ! ” 

Catharine was seized with sudden horror. Had the poor, 
demented one really committed some violence? Or was this 
talk merely the ravings of her diseased mind ? 

There was no more information to be obtained from Elsie. 
The storm, or perhaps some encounter in which she had been 
engaged, rendered her wild with excitement. She dared the 
lightning with her pale, clenched hand, and answered the thun- 
der with shrieks of defiance. She danced with her shadowy- 
white feet through the wet meadow-grass, and laughed like 
a riotous child, as the rain swept in gusts through her hair. 

When they neared the cottage, a change came upon her. 
She grew still and hushed, looking forward with breathless 
awe, and moving with the noiseless motion of a ghost. 

“Hush, hush,” she said, “we may disturb him, and then 
he w T ill follow her into the deep waters. Do you think she 
will stay there though? Who can keep her there? The 
monsters of the deep will hurl her back to land ; she is too 
wicked for them. The serpents that coil and knot them- 
selves among the rust, and gold, and scattered pearls that lie 
forever among the coral branches, down, down where the 
waters are calm like a baby’s dream — the serpents, I tell 
you, will uncoil and slink away into the black depths of the 
sea, rather than live with her, though she is their sister. Oh, 
if they would keep her. Do you think they can? I sent her 
down to them with my mark upon her throat — a hot mark, 


282 


Out in the Storm. 


red as blood. They will understand it. The mermaids, — 
listen, my bird of Paradise, — the mermaids are my friends ; 
I have lived with them years and years. They have strung 
pearls on my hair, and that ’s wdiat makes it so white. I 
wish you could see them floating, floating, floating, with pale 
green hair and emerald eyes. They sing, too. Oh, my bird, 
won’t they sing when she plunges downward headforemost in 
her rags, with my mark flaming on her throat ? Hosanna ! 
hallelujah ! Roll,, roll ye mighty thunders — roll, roll ! ” 

Elsie had uttered the first portion of this wild speech in a 
hoarse whisper as she glided by the cottage, but her voice 
rose as she proceeded, and at last broke forth into a fierce, 
reckless chant, like that with which Rachael electrified an 
audience, when she raved and moaned through the liberty 
chant of France. 

Catharine was impressed by the wild poetry that broke 
more from the eyes and action of the maniac than from her 
words. Still, she had an undercurrent of thought that led 
her to look wistfully at the cottage as she passed. The win- 
dow where she had seen a light was now darkened and closed ; 
everything was still, and she felt almost as if some fearful 
delusion were being practised upon her every way she turned. 

The rain had somewhat abated when the two females 
reached the house ; but even at its height the old people had 
evidently come forth in search of their child. Back and 
forth, among the shrubberies and beneath the old trees, they 
wandered, their hands nervously interlocked, and their fee- 
ble voices rising in anxious cries for their daughter. 

Elsie heard them, and sprang forward triumphantly. 

“ Come,” she said, “ come, you may breathe now ; the air 
is pure ; the earth may laugh with blossoms without fear of 
death-tramps from her cloven feet. Come now, let us sing 
together, we and the stars ! ” 

She waved her hand toward the sky where a few stars 
were struggling through an embankment of clouds, very pale 


283 


Coming Home from California . 

and languid after the vivid flashes of lightning they had 
just witnessed. 

“Come,” she cried again, “let us laugh, let us sing! 
Come, come, come ! ” 

Elsie led the way into the house, and went directly toward 
the library, leavirfg wet tracks upon the carpet, and wrapping 
her dripping garments close about her. 

The old people and Catharine followed in silence, shud- 
dering with the dampness and chilled with the cold, but car- 
ried on by the force of that insane will. 

Elsie flung open the library-door. A gust of wind swept 
through, meeting them as they entered from the bay-window, 
which was open to the night. 

“ Give me light, light ! I would look on him ; I will tell 
him myself.” 

Catharine struck a light, which flared and quivered as she 
held it upward. 

Elsie seized it fiercely and held it above her head, looking 
upward for the picture. It was gone ; a stained place upon 
the paper marked the spot it had occupied, and that was all. 

The candle dropped from Elsie’s hand, which was still 
uplifted as if paralyzed. 

“ Gone ! Oh, my soul, he has gone with her ! ” 

These words were uttered in a feeble, heart-broken voice, 
and Elsie glided away through the darkness into her cham- 
ber. For days and weeks she did not speak again. 


CHAPTER LIII. 

COMING HOME FROM CALIFORNIA. 

A STEAMER had just arrived, bringing passengers 
from the gold regions of California, — a rough, wild- 
looking set, whose half-savage aspect gave the impression 


284 


Coming Home from California . 

of a gang of returned convicts, rather than of refined and 
enterprising men, as most of them undoubtedly were. To 
have seen the coaches and hacks as they gave up their bur- 
dens at the various hotels, one would have fancied that the 
inhabitants of Van Diemen’s land had escaped in battalions, 
and were about to overrun the country. ♦ 

One of these carriages drew up at the Astor House, and 
a young man sprang out, carrying a portmanteau, which 
seemed of considerable weight, in his hand. His appearance 
was rather picturesque than otherwise, for he was one of 
these persons whom no disarray of costume could render 
less than gentlemanly. In fact, a black wide-awake, set 
carelessly a little on one side his head, was the most becom- 
ing thing in the world, and a Mexican blanket, bought from a 
fellow-passenger and flung over his arm, gave a brilliant 
contrast to his gray and travel-soiled clothes. A flowing 
beard, which no neglect could prevent from rippling down- 
ward in rich waves, veiled the lower portion of his face, re- 
vealing a finely curved mouth and a set of snowy teeth when 
he spoke or smiled. A noble and frank face it was, which 
looked so eagerly from beneath the hat we have mentioned. 

The young man went directly to the office, registered his 
name, and inquired, in an anxious voice, if Louis De Marke 
had left an address there. 

“ Louis De Marke,” was the reply, “ is an inmate of the 
house. He has been in town some months, and is probably 
in his room, No. .” 

The young man’s face lighted up. He flung down the 
pen with which he had just written “ George De Marke,” 
and taking up his portmanteau, followed the waiter, who 
stood ready to guide him through the intricacies of the 
establishment. « 

“ Never mind. This is the room, you need not announce 
me,” exclaimed De Marke, as the waiter paused before a 
chamber-door. 


285 


Coming Home from California. 

The waiter disappeared ; the door was opened hurriedly, 
and the quick exclamations, “Louis,” “George,” “brother,” 
were folio* ed by a warm embrace and an eager clasping of 
hands. 

Never perhaps has it happened, that two men, not twins, 
bore so close a resemblance to each other, as the persons 
who stood in that chamber, with their hands interlocked 
and their eyes sparkling with affectionate welcome. There 
was scarcely the fraction of an inch by which you could 
distinguish them in height or size. The same open, frank 
expression of face was there ; the form and color of the eyes 
were alike; indeed, save for the more neatly trimmed beard 
and perfect toilet of the one, you could not have known the 
brothers apart. Even in manner they were the same, for 
the careless but not ungraceful air which one brother had 
brought from his wild life in the gold regions, met its coun- 
terpart at once. The very smile and laugh of one had the 
sunshine and heart-warm richness of the other. 

The new-comer was perhaps some four years older than 
the other, but this was only detected by close examination. 

“And so you have come at last. O brother, brother! 
how I have wanted you ! ” said Louis, drawing his guest to 
a sofa, and shaking hands with him over and over again. 
“You have no idea how very, very much I have wanted 
y°u!” , 

A shade of trouble came over his face as he spoke, 
and instantly that of his brother darkened with the same 
l shadow, as if the pain which one felt must have a mutual 
vibration. 

“And I,” said George, with a sudden overshadowing of 
all cheerfulness, “ I have a great many things to say to you. 
Since we jwted, Louis, I have suffered as you will hardly 
think me capable of suffering.” 

“And I,” answered Louis, sorrowfully, — “and I.” 

George sat down by his brother, and threw one arm over 
his shoulder with a slight caress. 


286 


Coming Home from California. 

“ What is it, my brother ? I was in hopes that, save our 
one great cause of annoyance, you had escaped any serious 
trouble.” 

Louis shook his head and a mist crept over his eyes. 

“ It is a hard thing, George, for a fellow no older than I 
am, and disposed to be happy, as you and I both are. It is 
hard, I say, to carry about a secret, that one feels forever 
heavy upon the heart, but dares not talk about.” 

“* What is this secret, my brother ? ” 

Louis turned suddenly and seized his brother’s hand ; 
tears sprung to his fine eyes, and he choked down a sob 
that struggled hard with his manliness. 

“ George, before you went away I was married.” 

The elder brother started, and turned pale to the lips ; 
but he only said, — 

“ Go on, Louis, I listen.” 

“I had been married some months then. Do not be 
angry that I did not tell you.” 

“ Angry, why should I ? How dare I be angry with you 
for a concealment which — but I interrupt you ; go on.” 

“I think you would have liked Louisa. She was the 
dearest and most lovable girl in the world.” 

“ Was, Louis? You say was, as if your wife were dead.” 

“ Dead, O brother ! if this question could be answered! 
But it cannot. She is dead to me, I fear, and yet alive, she 
and her child.” 

“ Be calm, brother, and explain all this. Whom did you 
marry ? where is your w T ife ? ” 

“ I can hardly answer either question. She was an orphan, 
and had an only brother older than herself. The name was 
Oakley. She was in school, but staying with a lady who 
lived in the next street to us ; our gardens adjoined. I mean 
the year before our father died, when his family lived like 
civilized beings, for my mother had not then given herself 
up to avarice as a terrible passion. 


287 


Coming Home from California. 

“ This lady had a daughter somewhat older than her ward. 
I have since learned that she was also the aunt of Catharine 
Lacy, ^ou remember Catharine ?” 

George lifted one hand suddenly to his forehead. 

“Yes,” he answered, in a husky voice, “I remember her. 
She is dead.” 

“Yes,” answered Louis, thoughtfully. “Poor girl, she 
died in a strange way ; it was a wonderful thing altogether. 
This proud woman was her aunt, who bound her out to 
Madame; Catharine never once mentioned the fact; per- 
haps Mrs. Judson forbade her. Some one has the murder of 
that girl upon his soul.” 

“ Do not say that,” cried the young man, starting up dis- 
tractedly. “ She was my wife, Louis, my lawfully wedded 
wife ; and they let her die in a charity hospital ! It was 
our mother’s work, this foul murder. Louis De Marke, it 
was her work ! ” 

“ And this other woman is answerable for a like crime ! ” 
answered Louis, hoarsely. “ Louisa went to the same hospi- 
tal ; they were found side by side in that fearful sick-ward, 
your wife and mine. Poor young creatures, scarcely more 
than children themselves. I saw the record of Catharine’s 
death, but of my poor girl there is no record, save of a dis- 
charge. I have been unable to gain one trace of her since 
she left the hospital walls. It is now more than three years, 
George ; and I have borne this secret alone till my heart 
aches with the weight of it.” 

“ I know, I know what it is,” answered the elder brother, 
passionately. “ Thank God, we have met once more where 
at least the rash acts of our youth can find a voice. I little 
thought, Louis, how like your life had been to my own ! ” 

“ Poor girls, poor young creatures ! we led them into great 
misery, George.” 

George shrunk back, as if some thought, which had stung 
him for years, became a sudden pang. 


288 Coming Home from California . 

“ Youtli is sometimes very cruel,” he said, with the bitter- 
ness of self-reproach. “ But Heaven is my judge, I never 
intended wrong to my poor young wife. Her condition was 
miserable enough with Madame De Marke, after our father’s 
death; and our secret marriage could hardly render it 
worse.” 

“ But Louisa ! Her condition was happy enough, till I 
came to embitter it with my love ; for I loved, oh ! George, 
I thought I loved her ! ” 

' “But you talk at random, Louis. Even yet I cannot 
comprehend who this young person was, or how you became 
so fatally interested in her,” said George ; “ come, old fellow, 
tell me everything, — there is no fighting with death, but if 
your wife is above-ground, it will go hard if you and I can- 
not find her ? ” 

Louis shook his head ; but George spoke out again with 
well-assumed cheerfulness. “ Let me know every particular 
about this marriage, and I will go on a crusade for you — 
it will be like a romance. Indeed, our two lives are a 
romance. Who would believe that we have never lived 
under the same roof since you were an infant ; that I was 
bred in Germany, you here ; ' that we never met till both 
were men, yet loved each other dearly from the first. It 
was strange, for your mother hated me always. It was she 
who packed me off to a school in Germany when a mere 
child. My father sent me money and a letter twice a year. 
In time, my school was changed to a university ; after that 
I was sent to travel. Then a letter came to say that my 
father was dead. I came home a stranger ; not ten of my 
father’s nearest friends knew of my existence ; but we met 
as brothers should meet, thank Heaven for that ! For your 
sake I tried to like my father’s widow ; I sought her out 
and went to see her often. Would to Heaven I never had: 
then one of the sweetest and loveliest creatures that ever lived 
might have been saved.” 


Louis De Markers Confession ♦ 


289 


CHAPTER LIV. 


LOUIS DE MARKE’s CONFESSION. 



OUIS DE MARKE sat for some moments, with a hand 


-U to his forehead, perplexed, and, at heart, reluctant to 
speak. It is true he had been months and months pining 
for the company of his elder brother, resolving to give him 
all confidence, and to ask for both counsel and help, at his 
hands, but now he shrunk from speaking. At last he 
dropped his hand, and began, abruptly enough: — 

“ It was a sad romance to her, and to me. “ I have told 
you, my wife was an orphan and the ward of her only brother. 
Her father had been the intimate friend of Mrs. Judson, 
who I have since learned was Louisa’s godmother. The 
brother, after his father’s death, placed Louisa under this 
woman’s care.” 

“And you became acquainted with her? ” inquired George, 
deeply interested. 

“ Yes ! Our gardens adjoined ; the fences were open and 
low, and an arbor ran from one to the other. I was often 
in our side of this arbor, and the young ladies came down 
to the portion upon their grounds, with their books and 
music. You have never seen Mrs. Judson’s daughter. She 
was one of the loveliest creatures eyes ever dwelt upon, 
serene and gentle as an angel, a sort of moonlight beauty 
which one loves to dream over.” 

“You are speaking of Miss Judson now, not of the girl 
you loved ? ” questioned George, surprised at his eloquence. 

“ I will be truthful with you, George, even to my own 
shame. It was Miss Judson whom I first loved — Louisa 
was a secondary object with me then ; in fact, I considered 
her as a spoiled child. It was a mad passion, something 


18 


290 


Louis De Mar he s Confession, 


less than idolatry, my love for the other; a madness that — 
yes, let me confess it — that holds me yet.” 

“ And did she know of this passion ? ” 

“ How could she help it ? I was too young for concealment, 
but no words of love ever passed between us. We met fre- 
quently, in the way I speak of, and would stand on a pleasant 
moonlight evening, screened by the clustering vines, leaning 
on the light fence which separated their arbor from ours, 
saying little, but filled with a world of sweet thoughts that 
made these stolen hours the most delicious of my life. Yes, 
George, she must have known that I loved her, but I did not 
speak. How could I, with every dollar I expected to have 
in the hands of my mother, and she so grasping and avari- 
cious that I could scarcely persuade her to give me enough 
money to purchase food, for she had fairly starved me out 
of her house. 

“ Mrs. Judson, you remember, bought the house she lived 
in of our father, just before he died, and did not move into 
it until Madame had abandoned all attempts at respectable 
life, taking that poor girl Catharine with her. First, she 
went into an inferior dwelling, then to the garret where she 
is to be found now. 

“ I refused to give up my room in the old home, and she 
consented that I should board with the tenant to whom it 
was rented. In this way it happened that I was saved the 
shame of her interference, and kept our domestic troubles a 
secret from this proud girl, and as far as possible from the 
world. But you will understand that the dread of this ex- 
posure would keep me silent. I dared not tell this splendid 
girl that I was the legal dependant and slave of a woman who 
did not give herself the common decencies of life, out of the 
great wealth my father left, and that two years must pass 
before I could come to her mother as an independent gentle- 
man and ask her hand. Now I could do a thing like that, 
though the very idea of my mother’s life makes me shrink, 


Louis De Markers Confession . 291 

but then I was inexperienced, shy, and terribly depressed 
by the course my mother was pursuing. The great terror 
of my life was that those two persons should meet. 

“I loved this noble girl to distraction, and, brother George, 
I am sure that she loved me, though all this time she was 
engaged to another man.” 

“ Engaged to another man, and knew in her heart that 
you loved her ? ” 

“Do not blame her; had I spoken out, she might have 
found courage to break an engagement which, I am sure, was 
made at the persuasion of her mother. Yet I am told that 
Oakley was a noble young fellow, and loved her dearly. She 
was not unhappy with him.” 

“ How do you know that, brother Louis?” 

“ Because she has told me so since his death.” George 
De Marke crushed the wide-awake in his hand, while a low 
whistle expressed the new light that was dawning upon him. 

“ Well, go on,” he said, with a gleam of humor in his eyes. 

“All this time, while I was lavishing the first thoughts of 
my youth upon her, she was engaged. I was nothing to 
her ; Louisa told me this. Her own brother was betrothed 
to Miss Judson ; on his return they were to be married. 

“ I do not think Louisa saw my anguish, or my despair, 
when she gave me this information, for deep feelings are 
seldom the most demonstrative. I felt myself growing pale, 
my very lips were chilled through and felt like* marble as I 
closed them. She did not observe it. The very warmth 
was quenched in my veins, and she only said, as we shook 
hands in parting, — 

“ * How cold your hands are, but the night is a little chilly.’ 

“ As if influenced by some strange sympathy unexplained 
to her own heart, she bent down and kissed my hand ; but 
I shrunk from the touch of her lips — they sent a pang 
through and through me. At such times even the most 
delicate sympathy is painful. How could this be otherwise 
than bitter? 


292 


Louis De MarJce’s Confession . 

“ Those few words had blasted all the hopes of my life ; but 
how pould she understand this ? I must have seemed 
strangely cold and ungrateful to that poor girl, who loved 
me all the time, but, in the egotism of my anguish, I was 
unconscious that she was made to suffer also. 

“ I saw Miss Judson after this, and with her own lips she 
told me of her engagement. She was white and trembling 
all the time, while I stood taking the death-blow of my 
hopes, in dead silence. I think now, that she hoped for 
some protest, and in her heart longed for an explanation, 
which I had no power to give. The expression of her eyes 
haunted me afterward, so wistful, so tender — oh ! if I had 
spoken then. But I did not — could not. The image of 
my mother, in all her grim avarice, was standing before 
that young creature so pure, so exquisite in her refinement, 
made a coward of me. 

“ We parted that evening in mute anguish. Her hand was 
cold as snow when I dropped it from mine, and even in the 
moonlight I could see that her bosom swelled with proud 
grief. She never came to the garden after that, though I 
haunted it like a ghost. 

“ Oakley came at last to claim his bride. I heard of this 
through Louisa, who wandered into the arbor more fre- 
quently than ever, where she was almost certain to find me 
in sight. I was very wretched in those days, and, in the ego- 
tism of a first great sorrow, never thought to ask why this 
girl sought the old haunt so often. My object in seeking 
her was to obtain news of the woman I loved. In my 
thoughtless selfishness, I led the gentle girl into interviews 
that she might have misunderstood. 

“ Louisa was a sweet, kind girl, innocent as a child, and as 
confiding. Her society became a great relief to me, and I 
lost no opportunity of meeting her. Miss Judson was her 
superior in age, and in everything that goes toward making 
up a grand character ; but a more affectionate, truthful, and 
kind creature never lived, than Louisa Oakley. 


The Night of Miss Judson’s Wedding. 


293 


CHAPTER LV. 

THE NIGHT OF MISS JUDSON’s WEDDING. 

T HE night of that wedding was a terrible one to me. 

Tortured, wild, and filled with unutterable sorrow, I 
saw the house lighted up from roof to cellar. With my 
heart aching, and my head hot with pain, I stood by the 
window in my room listening to each sound, as a man con- 
demned to death hears the tramp of a crowd gathering to 
the scaffold on which he is to suffer. As each carriage 
| paused at the door, my heart shrunk within my bosom. 

“I was all alone in the house where our father died. You 
I were absent ; I had no human being to comfort me in the 
great agony of that bereavement, for there are bereavements 
worse than death, oh ! a thousand times worse than death. 

“ I had been all that afternoon walking the streets, in hopes 
that fatigue might weary out the pain I felt. Sometimes 
my whole nature rose up in rebellion against fate, and 
against myself. Why had I kept that long, cowardly silence ? 
I loved the girl a thousand times better than my own life ; 
yet had never told her of it. Held back by sensitive dread, 
I had allowed another man to take the woman I loved out 
of my life. Because my poor mother had faults, I had 
doomed myself to a lonely future. 

“ These harassing thoughts embittered the. pain I was suf- 
fering. I hated myself for the want of courage that had 
wrecked my hopes, and left me standing there, the most 
humiliated and wretched being, I do think, on earth. That 
moment my imagination was sharpened by pain : I fancied, 
in my anguish, all that might be passing in that stately 
dwelling : the bridegroom in his resplendent happiness, all 
unconscious that his good fortune was rending the hope 
from another man’s life; — the bride, robed in sumptuous 


294 The Night of Miss Judson’s Wedding. 

whiteness trembling upon the verge of that abyss, that was 
to separate us forever — I wondered if she thought of me. 
All at once a faintness, like that of death, fell upon me ; I 
saw the bride walking past the windows of her chamber ; 
her hand threw aside the curtains, while she looked forth 
upon the night, her beautiful head crowned with orange- 
blossoms, and the gossamer veil sweeping downward like the 
furled wings of a seraph. All excitement left me. I was 
sad and heart-broken. The sight of her sweet face filled 
my soul with tender^regrets, as if an angel, lost to me for- 
ever, had looked serenely down upon me, unconscious of my 
anguish and lifted forever above it.” 

The young man paused and wiped the drops of perspira- 
tion that even a remembrance of former anguish had brought 
to his forehead. 

“ I could not stay at the window after those crimson cur- 
tains closed upon my love, but went down to the garden, 
and leaning upon the frail fence by which we had stood so 
often, wept like a child. Remember, George, how young 
and inexperienced I was. 

“All at once, I heard a footstep on the gravel-walk ; and, 
through*my tears, I saw a figure coming toward me, glisten- 
ing white*, and pure through the moonshine. My heart leaped ; 
my breath, stopped. Could it be my lost love coming to say 
farewell ? V 

“ Hoping this, and faint with expectation, I waited for that 
white figure to draw nearer. It came swiftly ; I saw the face, 
and my heart fell back ; the breath left my lips in a moan. It 
was Louisa Oakley. She saw me in the arbor, and came 
forward witj^a glad look upon her face. I was in the 
shadow, and sne could not detect the sorrow on mine. The 
girl was very happy and full of pleasant excitement. 

“ ‘ I felt sure of finding you here/ she said, ‘ and came 
down to say how sorry I am that you are not one of the 
groomsmen. With you, I could stand up without trembling. 


The Night of Miss Judson’s Wedding. 235 

If you had only known my brother, it could have been man- 
aged, and then the wedding would be splendid.’ 

“I replied with such composure as I could command, but 
she detected the sadness in my voice, and mistook it for dis- 
appointment regarding an invitation to the wedding. 

“‘It couldn’t be helped,’ she said; ‘Mrs. Judson never 
dreamed how intimate we have all been ; besides, I think 
she was a little prejudiced against your mother.’ 

“ Louisa was very gentle and full of affectionate playfulness, 
but you can imagine how she wounded me by this mention 
of my mother. I felt keenly enough that, but for her, I 
might have stood where young Oakley was then. Oh, 
George, it was hard to bear ! 

“ The kind girl, feeling that I continued sad, insisted on 
standing out in the moonlight, that I could admire her 
dress, which fell about her in soft fleeciness, like drifts of 
newly fallen snowflakes. She was not very beautiful, but 
the whiteness and tender radiance of the moon, falling 
around her as she stood crowned with roses, made a lovely 
picture of which she was shyly proud. It was that I might 
see her in her pretty dress that she had come down to me, 

I think. 

“ These things may seem trivial, George, but the details of a 
painful event fix themselves terribly on the memory. There 
was not a word spoken that night, or a shadow upon the win- 
dows of that house, which was not imprinted on my soul forever. 

“I called Louisa from her conspicuous position in the 
moonlight — for her white garments seemed like grave- 
clothes to me — and with a quietness that seemed marvellous 
to me, inquired if the bride seemed happy. Jj* was a despe- 
rate question, but my heart struggled yet for so§£ hope, that, 
even at the bridal hour, she would think of me with regret. 

“ Louisa answered innocently enough that she had never 
seen a happy bride in her life. The persons to be married 
were ahvays nervous and frightened. It was only the brides- 


296 The Night of Miss Judson’s Wedding . 

maids that really enjoyed themselves. As for her brother, 
he was happy as a king ; but the bride said so little and 
moved about so quietly that there was no judging about 
her. 

“Then I asked, ‘Had the bride ever spoken of me?’ 
My voice was steady, but I drew no breath till the answer 
came. 

“ ‘ Yes/ Louisa said, ‘ now that I think of it, there has 
been some conversation about you this very evening. 
When the dress was laid out, the bride whispered, with 
tears in her eyes, “ He will never see me in my wedding- 
dress ! he, our best friend ! Oh, Louisa, if it could only be 
put off a little longer.” 

“‘But that was all nervousness, you know/ continued my 
tormentor, for spite of her kindness she was sure that ‘ this 
getting married is sure to make one want to hold back just 
at the time, I suppose. She can’t help being happy ; who 
could with a husband handsome and kind like my brother? 
I tell you, he is splendid — the best fellow in the world. 
Never fear — they will be happy as the day is long, both so 
handsome, and good as gold.’ 

“ I grew impatient under all this. Did that girl love to 
torture me? What did she tell me these things for? Was 
she determined to crush my heart? or drive me mad? I 
answered her with sharp impatience. What, I do not re- 
member, and probably did not know at the time. But it 
must have sounded harshly to the poor girl, for she went 
into the house weeping ; I did not regard it at the time. 
She had given me a fresh pang, and I had no pity for her. 
My whole being was absorbed in self-compassion ; there was 
not a creature in the world to whom I could have spoken 
except you, George, and you were away. 

“ When Louisa left me, I went up to my chamber ; it was 
a back-room overlooking the gardens. I sat by the wjndow 
all night, for my grief and the solitude were complete. I 


The Brothers talk over their Father’s Death. 297 

heard the carriages disappear, while the hum of voices grew 
faint upon the night-air. I saw the blaze of lights go out, 
and at last the beating of my own heart was the loudest 
sound I heard. 

“The daylight flashed around me where I had sat so 
many dreary hours, but still I remained motionless, letting 
the morning deepen toward the noon. It seemed to me that 
I should never care to stir again. I was aroused as if from 
a dull dream, by the noise of a carriage driven down the 
opposite street. It was Oakley, with his bride, on their way 
to the European steamer. It seemed as if the horses that 
bore her away were tramping my heart under their hoofs ; 
but when the sound died in the distance, my breath came 
more freely. It was over, and I knew the worst. When 
that knowledge comes to any brave soul, fate has lost half 
its power to torture ! ” 

“ I know it,” answered the brother, who, shrouding his 
face with one hand, while his elbow rested on the table, had 
listened attentively. “ But fate sometimes leaves a long, 
dull waste of lurid hopes to mourn over, after the worst is 
known.” 


CHAPTER LVI. 

THE BROTHERS TALK OVER THEIR FATHER^ DEATH. 

L OUIS,” said George De Marke, “how long was all this 
after our father’s death ; I have never had a thorough 
knowledge of that time. Everything connected with it was 
too painful for questions.” 

“ I remember,” answered Louis, “ she had driven you 
from the house before I was old enough to know that I had 
a brother. You were happier for it. Year by year, our home 


298 The Brothers talk over their Father's Death. 

had become more uncomfortable and dreary. As age crept 
on our father, some cause of strife, which always existed, 
seemed to break out afresh between him and Madame. I 
never thoroughly understood it, George; there was something 
in the past never explained to us. Quick w r ords and broken 
sentences, which I remember now, though scarcely noticed 
at the time, connect this mystery with your own mother.” 

George De Marke looked up with sudden interest. “ It is 
strange,” he said, “ but I never heard anything about my 
mother. Madame never mentioned her ! ” 

“Nor did my father; during his life I was kept so far 
apart from his confidence, that I never ventured to question 
him regarding his or her family. Indeed, it was years be- 
fore I knew that Madame w r as not alike your mother and 
mine. It was discovered to me at last by some angry words 
with which she was taunting him, as if some disgrace had 
been attached to your birth. This made me angry at the 
time, but I accepted it as little more than a burst of fiery 
malice. Forgive me, dear boy, for saying so of my mother; 
but she was used to saying what came uppermost in her mind 
when he offended her, and I gave it no importance.” 

“I dare say it had no importance,” said George, “she 
must always have delighted in tormenting him.” 

“That is probably true, dear boy — but as I became a 
man, the fact that I knew T absolutely nothing of my mother’s 
family forced itself upon me. If my father had been living, 
I w T ould know all about her. Had I been here when he 
died, that one subject should not have been left in the dark.” 

“You would not have had the heart to question him, 
George. He was sadly changed before he died, and so ner- 
vous that a word would make him tremble. Sometimes the 
very sound of my mother’s voice would set him to shaking 
all over.” 

“My poor father ! Did he suffer so much?” inquired 
George, shading his eyes to conceal the tears that sprung 
into them. 


The Brothers talk over their Father’s Death . 299 


“ More than I can remember without pain/’ answered 
Louis. “ He took a terrible dislike to Madame toward the 
last, and I had great difficulty in protecting him from her 
temper and cupidity. Y ou cannot know how difficult it was, 
in health, for his iron will to keep down her parsimony in 
our household; when he lay sick and helpless, I found it 
almost impossible to obtain necessary comforts for him.” 

“Poor man! so rich — so proud, and brought to that! He 
must indeed have been miserable.” 

“ Y es, both in body and mind,” was the answer ; “lam sure 
that something preyed on him at the last. But Madame 
never left him at this period, and though he seemed anxious 
to converse with me, her presence always prevented it.” 

“ Strange what could have troubled him so ! Possibly it 
might have been that he repented of that strange will.” 

“ Not altogether that, I think. It was some persons he 
wished to see, — an old man and woman. Madame spoke of 
them impatiently in that way, but promised to send for them.” 

“And did she ?” 

“ No, there was no effort made to send for any one. An- 
other night, when he w T as growing worse and worse, I heard 
him pleading with her ; some person was to be sent for whom 
he wished to speak with before he died — must speak with if 
she was on the face of the earth. Madame became furiously 
angry then. She no longer attempted to pacify him with 
promises, but filled the sick-room with her angry revilings, 
while he lay trembling under her violence till the bed shook 
beneath him. At last, urged on by rage, such as I had never 
seen even in her before, she darted toward the bed, and 
would have seized him by the shoulders, but I flung my arms 
around her, and prevented the sacrilege by taking her almost 
by force from the room. When I came back to the bed, 
our father was stricken with paralysis. 

“ Oh, George ! it would have broken your heart, could you 
have seen his beseeching eyes follow me around the room 


300 The Brothers talk over their Father’s Death . 


after that. I knew that he would have spoken to me then, 
had the power been left him. Once, when Madame was out 
for a moment, he made a desperate effort to speak, but his 
voice came forth in a broken moan ; and I saw two great 
tears roll from the pleading eyes, wrung from some want 
which he had no power to express.” 

“Could he not write?” inquired George, in a troubled 
voice. 

“No; he made an effort, and with his poor shaking hand, 
strove to scrawl a name; but I could not read it; Madame 
came in while I was trying to make it out. With an angry 
glance at him, she took it from my hand and tore it up. 

“My poor father’s eyes turned upon her with an expression 
that would have melted a heart of iron. I have heard of 
wounded stags, weeping while under the torment of a pack 
of hounds, George. The great tears which came again to 
that old man’s eyes, when his wife — I will not call her 
mother with this feeling upon me — tore up the name he 
had tried to write, seemed as if shed under like torture.” 

“All this fills me with self-reproach. I ought to have 
been by my poor father’s death-bed. I being older than' 
you, might have comprehended his wishes,” said George De 
Marke, sadly. 

“I cannot tell, George; it might have been a wish to re- 
deem the injustice of his will ; sometimes I think it was only 
his lawyer’s name that he wrote ; for Madame looked like 
death when she read it. I am sure she did read it, illegible 
as it w r as, for she muttered something that made the sick 
man struggle in his bed. Nothing but the fear of losing her 
grasp on the property could have disturbed her so ! ” 

“ It was a strange will, and unjust as strange,” said George. 
“ Why should our father have feared to trust my intellect 
more than yours, Louis? If at thirty I have never given 
proofs of insanity, and am the father of a lawful son, then 
and not till then can I demand an equal share of the prop- 


The Brothers talk over their Father’s Death. 301 

erty with yourself. This is a strange clause against an elder 
son, who has never offended him, or deserved anything but 
kindness at his hands.” 

“ ^ is indeed. The anxieties of his death-bed must have 
arisen from this cause. But it was all needless ; for though 
I had a hard struggle to get my portion from Madame at 
the time of my majority, it is safe from her control now, 
and the income is enough for us both.” 

George reached forth his hand, grasping that of his 
brother with grateful warmth. 

“You forget,” he said, pointing to his portmanteau, “that 
I am just from the gold region, and though not able to com- 
pete with my rich brother, there will be found yonder enough 
of gold and bills of exchange for my moderate wants, till 
the time appointed by my father’s will arrives.” 

“Are you so rich as that, George? I am glad of it; in- 
dependence is the right of every man, but I should have 
liked to divide with you, after all.” 

“ I am sure you would, dear old fellow ; but the time is 
not far off, and I think it will go hard for any one to give 
proofs of insanity against me so far ; and if my brain has 
withstood all that I have endured till now, it will probably 
hold firm to the end.” 

“Yes, that will be easily settled. But the babe? Poor 
Catharine Lacy left no living child, so it is stated in the 
hospital record.” 

“ So it is recorded ; poor girl ! poor wronged wife ! ” 

“ She was a lovely creature,” said Louis, “ a sweet, gentle 
girl. How was she driven to such straits, George?” 

“It is answered in a sentence,” was the stern reply. 
“ Madame De Marke, who had doubtless suspicions of our 
private marriage, induced me to go to India, by promises of 
giving a portion of my inheritance into my own indepen- 
dent possession. She had entire control, even of the income, 
you know. In his large shipping-interest, my father had 


302 The Brothers talk over their Father's Death. 


left unsettled affairs at Calcutta, which she professed to be 
very anxious about. I was to remain abroad two years and 
settle up all his affairs in the East, as the price of my ow T n 
independence. I had just married Catharine Lacy, who 
urged me to make this sacrifice, and expressed herself will- 
ing to stay with Madame, hard as her life was, until my 
return. 

“ If Madame knew of our marriage, her dissimulation was 
complete, for she gave no sign of such knowledge. I now 
understand it all. She either had information of the mar- 
riage and wished to separate us, or had a suspicion that the 
poor child was devoted to me, and that by marrying her, 
one condition of the will might be secured.” 

“ It is possible,” muttered Louis. 

“ With this promise, she sent me to the East Indies, where 
letters might not reach me for months ; made that delicate 
girl a drudge of all work, and at last drove her to despera- 
tion, to the Almshouse, and, God pardon her ! — I never can, 
— to death.” 

“ It was a terrible fate,” said Louis ; “ but in charity to 
my mother, let us hope she was not all to blame. There 
was a time, George, when I can remember her a stylish and 
attractive woman — never generous or liberal, it is true, but 
far, far above what she is now. The powerful will of our father 
kept down her faults, and at his death they broke over all 
control. It seems to me that, on this one subject of money, 
she is a monomaniac.” 

“You are her son, Louis, and heaven knows I have little 
wish to wound you by talking of her failings ; but you will 
comprehend how they bear on this case. If I fail to accom- 
plish the conditions of our father’s will, this property goes to 
your mother during her life, and afterward to you.” 

“ Yes, I know ; there the sting lies. It is, in fact, my in- 
terest she is seeking. It is for me that she hoards and starves, 
and has committed this terrible wrong.” 


The Brothers talk over tlieir Father’s Death. 303 


“ No, it is for the love of hoarding. Did she not struggle 
to keep possession of your portion also?” 

“ But that was for my own good, Madame urged ; she was 
in terrible trouble about my fancied extravagance, and 
w'ould gladly share her den with me in order to roll up her 
income. I really think it grieves her that I will not consent 
to this. But we were speaking of Catharine Lacy. I was 
in complete ignorance of everything you have told me re- 
garding her. Indeed, my whole attention was too painfully 
occupied elsewhere. I was absent wdien Madame made her 
degrading change of residence.” 

“ I know it ; we were both sent out of the way, while she 
made arrangements for a life of miserable parsimony. Had 
I dreamed of the way she intended to live, my poor young 
wife w r ould never have been left to her mercy. From her 
own confession, Catharine almost perished of absolute want 
in her miserable den.” 

“But her aunt, Mrs. Judson, was a rich woman. It is 
strange that she did not apply to her,” said Louis. “ Did 
she never think of that?” 

“ I cannot tell. Probably the poor angel kept her word 
too faithfully. She had promised not to make our mar- 
riage known. Remember, Louis, I was young, and did not 
think of the cruel necessity that might arise to protect her- 
self by this very confession. When it came, Madame turned 
her into the street, and somehow — I had no heart to inquire 
the harrowing particulars — she reached the hospital, and 
died there ! ” 

The brothers were silent for some minutes; when they 
looked up, it was through a mist of tears which no manly 
pride could suppress. 

“They were together, your wife and mine,” said Louis, at 
last, drawdng a hand across his eyes. “ Poor Catharine ! — 
poor Louisa ! ” 

George did not answer, but his chest heaved, and his face 


304 


The Secret Marriage. 


fell forward upon the arms which were folded on the 
table before him. At last he lifted his face, pale and tear- 
stained, turning it to his brother. 

“This remembrance is killing me, Louis. We will never 
talk these matters over again.” 

“ As you think best, George,” replied the brother, “ but I 
must speak with you. My situation is more painful than 
yours, for suspense is added to the rest ! ” 

“ True, true. I interrupted your story, Louis. Y ou see 
how selfish grief is.” 


CHAPTER LVII. 

THE SECRET MARRIAGE. — LOUIS GOES ON WITH HIS STORY. 

I THINK, George, that concentration of feeling belongs 
to our race. I felt when Oakley carried off the only 
being I could ever love, that life would thereafter be desola- 
tion to me. 

“ This very feeling led me to seek the society of Louisa 
Oakley, who remained with Mrs. Judson, and still met me 
as of old. She was the only person of whom I could hear 
tidings of my lost love, the sole link that connected me with 
the romance of my youth. When letters came to her from 
abroad, she brought them for me to read, little dreaming 
of the heart-aches they gave me. Mrs. Judson was a proud, 
cold woman, full of sanctimonious reserves chilling to an 
impulsive young creature like Louisa. Her ideas of duty 
were rigid, her whole life, as she said almost in her prayers, 
one series of the most perfect rectitude. For any human 
being to suppose that she had a fault, was a proof of de- 
praved judgment, for which she could find no possibility of 
excuse. 

“ You can imagine, brother George, that a home presided 


305 


The Secret Marriage. 

over by a woman so coldly perfect, would be a cheerless 
abode for an ardent, gentle girl, after a companion like Miss 
Judson had left it. You can imagine also, that her heart 
would turn for sympathy wherever it could be found. 

“ Louisa was incapable of concealment or dissimulation 
of any kind. It was not long before the conviction forced 
itself upon me, that, heart and soul, this young creature 
loved me. This was a wretched discovery, and, at first, 
aroused nothing but repulsion in my heart ; but that which 
I had myself suffered came back, in a thousand gentle 
and compassionating feelings. The pain still fresh in my 
own bosom was too recent ; I could not inflict it upon another, 
that other a creature so lovable and so good, — my only 
friend. 

“ There was no confession of attachment in words, but 
from the day of this discovery our interviews in the arbor 
became more subdued, and the compassion which I felt for 
her must have taken a shade of tenderness. It was not 
love, but what young girl of sixteen could have detected the 
difference between the gentle gratitude with which a be- 
reaved heart receives affection, and the bright outgushing 
of an impulsive attachment ? 

“ I was not quite of legal age, and was left under the con- 
trol of Madame, as you know, by our father’s will. She de- 
cided that I should spend at least a year abroad — you re- 
member there was an excuse of financial business to be set- 
tled there also — and I had no power, and scarcely a wish, 
to oppose her. But the effect of this arrangement on Louisa 
astonished me. She was in absolute despair ; the feelings, 
that, up to this time, had been implied rather than ex- 
pressed, now broke all bounds. No argument of mine would 
reconcile her to a separation. She conjectured a thousand 
evils that would follow my absence. Her brother would 
take her away — she would be forced to give me up — to 
marry some other person utterly repugnant. 

19 


306 


The Secret Marriage . 


“I was very young — you know, George — and to any 
man an attachment so earnest and passionate would have 
been gratifying. When argument and entreaties failed to 
convince her that an eternal separation was not threatened, 
I — rashly, madly — proposed a private marriage before my 
departure. She assented too readily, poor girl ! Her guar- 
dian was away for a short visit out of town. There was no 
one but a housekeeper to control her movements. We stole 
out one evening and were married. The clergyman found 
witnesses, and I placed the certificate he gave us in my 
pocket-book. Neither of us thought how important it might 
become, and it was forgotten when we parted. 

“ I dared not own my marriage, dependent, as I was, for 
every dollar I used upon my mother ; and feeling that she 
would cast me out penniless, I could see no way but to leave 
my young wife where she was till my return. Soon after 
that I should be of age, and so far as property was con- 
cerned, independent to claim and protect my wife. 

“ Our voyage was a protracted one, as you know. Ac- 
cidents happened to my letters. It was months before I 
heard from my young wife. Her first letter was full of af- 
fection, the second struck me as saddened in its tone. They 
had been written months when I received them. Then 
followed complete silence. Up to this time my mother had 
lived very plainly indeed. I left her, as you will remember 
§iat I told you, in the poorest house on our father’s estate, 
J iut her method of existence had not sunk to its present level. 
WVhen I came back she had taken up life in her present 
miserable abode. Catharine Lacy, so long a sunbeam in 
; our house, had disappeared. Louisa! my wife! you know 
what my compassion drove her to — a pauper bed at 
Bellevue. 

The week I returned home, a package of letters that had 
followed me half over the continent, reached New York. 
They were from my wife, and told me her mournful story. 


Louisa’s Letters. 


307 


Up to the very hour of her anguish she wrote every thought 
and feeling of her heart; poor, poor child, how she suffered; 
how she may yet be suffering ! 

“ During the absence of her guardian, who had gone with a 
party to the springs, she fled from the house, and in lier 
helplessness sought a home wherever it could be found. 
This rash step the poor child had taken to escape a dis- 
graceful expulsion from the house of her guardian. With 
no marriage certificate, for, thoughtless wretch that I was, it 
still remained in my possession, and unable to find proofs 
for herself that she was a wife, the poor girl wandered off, 
hoping to get shelter somewhere till I returned. She was 
willing to face poverty, but not the woman from whom no 
pity was ever to be expected for weakness or disobedience. 

“ The letters I have with me still. The latest, you will see, 
are written at and dated from Bellevue. After following 
me from place to place, they reached me here covered with 
post-marks. Bead them, George, — I cannot; every word 
is written in fire upon my soul.” 

Louis turned away his pale face and shrouded his eyes as 
his brother read. 


CHAPTER LYIII. 

LOUISA’S LETTERS. 

M Y HUSBAND : — Once again I write to you from 
the depths of a weary heart, without hope, without 
a belief that you will ever see my letter, but I must speak 
to you before I die ! for it seems to me impossible to live 
and face that woman. I wrote to you again and again, 
Louis. I told you of the terrible strait to which I was 
driven. I appealed to you from the depths of my humilia- 
tion. I besought you to give back my secret and send the 


308 


Louisa’s Letters. 


proofs of our marriage before it was too late — before dis- 
grace fell upon me, and the shelter of a respectable roof was 
taken from over my head. 

“ You did not answer. Day after, day I waited, day after 
day I stole like a thief to the post-office, and read over, 
name by name, the list of advertised letters, hoping against 
convictions that yours had been overlooked in the delivery. 
None came. Oh ! if you could think how desolate I grew ; 
all alone, so young, so full of dark foreboding — I feared 
the proud woman to whose guardianship my brother had 
left me. Her black eyes seemed to follow me everywhere. 
I trembled at the sound of her footsteps. In my dreams, 
her presence overshadowed me till my brain ached with the 
oppression. 

“ One night she came to me in my chamber. I was in 
bed weeping, but she did not seem to hear it. The light 
was dim, and my face turned to the wall. Possibly she did 
not know how wretched I was. 

“ ‘ You seem sad and depressed/ she said; ‘is it because 
you have no companion in the house ? or are you pining over 
the absence of your brother and friend ? ' 

“ I tried my best to answer steadily, but the tears would 
come ; for her manner was strangely kind, and, for the first 
time in my life, I longed to throw my arms around her neck 
and ask her to pity me. 

“Tam not quite well/ I said ; ‘ the study is hard, and I 
cannot bear so much as some girls/ 

How would you like to go into the country a while?' 
she asked. 

“ ‘ To the country, — some farm-house where I might have 
a chance to be alone. Oh, if I could ! If I could ! ' — 

“ ‘ Not quite so rural as that/ she said, 4 but if you like 
it, we will go to Saratoga.' 

“ My heart sunk within me. Saratoga ! and with her ! I 
answered faintly, that I would much rather stay at home 


Louisa’s Letters. 


309 


and rest. At first she opposed this, but I pleaded so hard 
for quiet and solitude, that she at last consented and left me 
at home, only extracting a promise that I should receive no 
company, nor go out alone. The next morning, she started 
on her journey. I watched her from the window as she got 
into the carriage. It was a relief to see her go, but my 
heart was heavy as death. In her way she had been kind 
to me and I was deceiving her. 

She is gone ; and the great solitary house is mine to roam 
in as I please. I go down to the arbor twenty t^mes a day. 
The clematis vine is white with blossoms, as it was the day 
you told me how dear I would ever be to you. I sit down 
under the shadows that twinkle around me with every stir 
of the leaves, and think of you, your looks, your words, the 
expression of your face when we parted, till my heart swells 
with the joy and pain of memories that are my glory, and 
yet kill me. Oh, if you were only here — if I could but see 
you a single moment ! But God help me, an ocean divides 
us ! I may never see you again. Sometimes I think it will 
be so, and that makes the thought of death terrible. 

“ The loneliness here would be pleasant, but for the dread 
of what is to come. I think of her return with terror. If I 
hear a carriage in the street, my heart stands motionless till 
it has passed the house. I dare not meet her again. What 
can I do ? Where shall I go ? Louis, Louis, my heart will 
break if I do not hear from you 

“A friend of Mrs. Judson’s called here this morning; she 
says that my guardian may come back any day. She wishes 
the house to be in readiness. I must go ; but where ? Father 
of mercies, tell me where ! 

“ When the lady was gone, I went up to my room, and 
throwing myself on the bed, almost prayed to die. It was 
wicked, I know ; but I am afraid ! Oh, if you were only here, 
my husband — if you were only here ! I have been lying 
still as death, thinking and planning until thought tortured 


310 


Louisa’s letters. 


me. A thousand wild prospects of concealment till you 
came, presented themselves ; but they were all vague and 
impracticable. About midnight I arose softly, and finding 
a lamp, searched through my drawers for money and trin- 
kets. A few dollars, and a more costly supply of jewelry than 
most girls of my age are allowed to possess, was all that I 
could depend upon. These, with a few valuable laces, I tied 
up and locked in my wardrobe ; for I must go — I must go ! 
Once more I will steal to the post-office. God may have mercy 
upon me and send the letter I have asked for so often — oh, 
so often. I have been — I have been — nothing there. 
Over and over again I read the printed list through my 
blinding tears. My name w 7 as not there. Nothing for me — 
nothing for me ! Then my last hope,.went out, and I wan- 
dered off anywhere in search of a hiding-place, where death 
might find me undisgraced. In a narrow, uncleanly street, 
I saw a sign on which ‘ Boarding ’ was written in great yel- 
low letters. I knocked timidly at-the door, shuddering at 
the sound my own hands made. I will not describe the in- 
terior of this house. It would make you wretched ; for you 
have not intended to be cruel. 

“The woman who received me pvas kind enough, but 
uncouth and slatternly. She asked no questions, and I was 
too tired and wretched for any question about her prices. 
They seemed reasonable for a small chamber in the back 
of the house, with decent food, — a garret almost, and very 
gloomy. So much the better ; it was the more removed from 
notice. 

“ The next day I told the servants that I had received a 
letter from Mrs. Judson and must go away at once. I took 
the precaution to send for a carriage, and in all things leave 
the house as I should have done had Mrs. Judson really ex- 
pected me. 

“I let the man drive me to a railroad depot, then dis- 
charged him and took another carriage which left me^and 


At Bellevue Hospital . 


311 


my trunk at the house which was to be my home. Just at 
night I stole away to this desolate shelter, and here, Louis, I 
remain utterly alone, never going out, even for a breath of 
air 

“ At last, everything is gone, money, trinkets, clothing, 
piece by piece. I have given them to the woman who 
supplied me with food and shelter, and now my destitution 
is complete. 


CHAPTER LIX. 


AT BELLEVUE HOSPITAL. 


ET me do this woman no injustice. She was not wantonly 



JlJ cruel, but a life of hard poverty had made her cautious. 
She did not turn me away absolutely friendless, but took me 
to this, my last shelter, Bellevue Hospital. Perhaps it was 
all that she could do. The poor are sometimes forced to be 
cruel, and she was very poor. 

“ Oh ! my husband, God forbid that you should ever see 
the rooms and the people with whom I have spent this last 
miserable week — the last of my life, I am certain it will be 
the last of my life. They have given me a narrow straw bed 
and a wooden chair, on which I sit all the day long with 
my face to the wall, dreaming such leaden, gloomy dreams. 
Now and then an oath or a coarse laugh makes me shudder 
to think where I am. 

“Sometimes when a strange step comes along the floor, my 
poor heart gives a struggle, and I think it is you come to 
look after your poor little wife. Then I fancy in a desperate 
way that my brother will come to the hospital in search of 
me ; and I feel a dreary satisfaction that with this dress, 
this thin face, and great wild eyes, he would go away and 
never dream it was me. Besides, I have never used either 


312 


At Bellevue Hospital. 


his name or yours ; when you come to look for the register 
of my death, ‘ Mary Barton is the name.’ Next to it you 
will find written the brand of infamy which I do not de- 
serve : but my promise was given. 

“I have told no one of our marriage; but the angels will 
know it, and you will know it. And now I wish to write of 
something else, but cannot. My eyes fill with tears, my 
cheek burns, and my pen wanders to and fro on the paper. 
I charge you, Louis De Marke — I charge you with my 
dying breath, sweep the disgrace I am willing to bear my- 
self from the name of your child ! 

“Oh, Louis! my heart is broken; the last gleam of hope 
has departed. I shall not have the power to die, for this 
anguish will put death aside. Now I understand the dreary 
doubt which has been forever haunting my life. It was an 
unconscious want which kept me restless from the first. 
Now I comprehend it all. You never loved me. I have 
forced myself to write the words — it seems like tearing a 
young tree up by the roots. All the strings and pulses of 
my heart quiver. 

“Why not have told me this before it was too late? but no, 
it was a happy delusion; I cannot grudge myself the only 
sweet dream of my life. The truth would not have made 
me less desolate now. 

“How did I learn this? — listen. In the next bed to 
mine is a young person, whose face struck me from the first, 
a fair, beautiful girl, with the most sorrowful eyes I ever 
saw. She came to the hospital shortly after I did, and like 
me, sat by her bed day after day, in mournful silence. 
Sometimes she would sew a little — sometimes read a tract 
or the Bible, which so few inmates of that place ever touch. 
It is hard to be utterly alone in the world, and I had been 
months without intercourse with a human being of my own 
class. One day, when she looked unusually sad, I spoke to 
her, and after that we fell into miserable companionship, for 


313 


At Bellevue Hospital . 

I knew by every look and word, that she never had be- 
longed to the class of women about us. 

“ I think two more unhappy beings never lived than we 
were; still, there was some consolation in the mournful sym- 
pathy which we felt for each other. Some days, when the 
morning sunshine came through the window which separated 
her bed from mine, we would get up a gleam of cheerful- 
ness, and strive to encourage each other, knowing all the 
time how futile it wa3. When I attempted to comfort her, 
she answered me kindly, but was too sorrowful for consola- 
tion. The gloom of coming anguish, and probable death, 
hung over us both. We had no heart for words. 

“ It is terrible here at night. I cannot sleep, with so many 
strange women breathing heavily around me. The hush of 
the city chills me through and through. It seems like 
lying in a graveyard, especially when the slow sob of the 
river comes up to me through the silence. This other poor 
girl is often awake in the night. When she does sleep, it is 
restlessly, and sometimes her moans break into words. 

“ This night, this very night — it seems long as eternity — 
she began to murmur in her dreams as I lay weary and 
wakeful. All at once I started up in bed and listened. 
She had uttered a name, — your name, De Marke, uttered 
it softly as a dove coos in its nest. 

“ That one word was a revelation to me. Quick as light 
my thoughts flew back to the past — a thousand proofs, 
trivial but convincing, crowded upon me. The vague un- 
certainty that had kept me always so restless, was a miser- 
able conviction now. No, not yet, I would not believe the 
mutterings of a dream — there should be no uncertainty. 

“ I leaned from my cot and grasped the white arm of 
the sleeping girl, which had fallen downward over the side 
of her bed. She awoke with a start, and I saw her blue 
eyes fixed wildly on my face. 

“ ‘ Tell me,’ I said, ‘ was it the son of George De Marke, 


314 


At Bellevue Hospital . 

a shipping-merchant lately dead, of whom you spoke but 
now?’ She lifted her white hands and clasped them 
wildly. 

“ ‘ Did I speak of him ? when ? how ? Who tells me that 
I spoke of De Marke ? ’ she said. 

“‘In your sleep, a moment since/ I answered; ‘tell me 
about him, I must know!’ She looked at me wildly, but 
did not answer. ‘ Tell me/ I said, ‘ do you love this 
man?’ -7 

‘{‘Better than my life! — better than my own soul she 
answered, lifting her clasped hands to heaven. 

“ ‘ And he — did he love you ? ’ 

“ I asked the question faintly, my lips were cold, my heart 
in an agony of suspense. She turned her eyes upon me — 
those beautiful blue eyes — full of tears that glittered pain- 
fully before my sight. 

‘U JLove me ? yes, I am sure he does — sure as I am of my 
life.’ 

“ I tightened the grip of my hand upon her arm, for 
agony made me strong, and I was unconscious of the cruelty, 
till she shrunk away quivering from my touch. 

“ ‘ Then God help you, and forgive him ! ’ I said. She did 
not speak, but cowered down in her cot, with a low moan, as 
if my words had wounded her to death. At last she said to 
me timidly, for my wild anguish had frightened her. 

“ ‘ Why do you speak in this way ? God is over all, and he 
knows there is nothing to forgive/ 

“ I remembered my promise then. No wrong that you 
could inflict, would absolve me from that. It was on my 
lips to say this man is my husband, but I drew the bitter 
truth back into my heart, where it shall lie buried forever. 

“I answered her question vaguely, saying that I did not 
think any good man would have permitted her to come 
there. 

“ Then she began to cry bitterly, and amid her tears begged 


315 


At Bellevue Hospital. 

me not to think so. Her coming there was no fault of the 
person we were speaking of. He was far away across the 
ocean, and could know nothing of it. 

“ I have risen from my cot, and seated on the floor, I 
scrawl this, by the dim night-lamp upon the wall. She may 
be asleep ; I dare not speak to her again ; I have nothing 
more to learn, nothing to hope for. 

“ It is morning, I have folded my letter, and send it after 
you, black with shadows. If my fate is life, you and I shall 
never meet again on this earth. I am a poor, weak woman, 
but not poor enough, even in this place, to wait for a man 
who married me out of compassion for the great love I bore 
him. 

“ Oh ! how I did love you, my husband, how I do love you 
this miserable minute — forgive me! forgive me! I shall 
never say this to you again ; but every pulse beats with love 
for you — but you! It was only pity. At sunset last night 
I was ill, and afraid to die. The day has broken, and I am 
praying God in mercy to let me die. You never loved me ! 
miserable thought. If God grants my prayer, look for the 
record ! It will be Mary Barton, died so and so. The name 
will pass unnoticed by every one else. You will under- 
stand that it is your poor wife who died here all alone. 
Then you will pity her, and perhaps love her memory a 
little. Let me sign your name? It will be the first and last 
time. Louisa He Marke.” 

When George He Marke finished reading this letter, Louis 
dropped the hand from over his forehead, and parted his lips 
as if to speak ; but the pallid agony of his brother’s, face 
checked him ; and they, who had met so eagerly, sat together 
minute after minute in dumb silence. At length Louis spoke. 

“It was a terrible mistake, but one which no human fore- 
sight could have prevented,” he said. “ Poor girl ! if she is 
ever found — but this seems almost hopeless. I have omitted 
nothing in my search for her.” 


316 


At Bellevue Hospital . 

George made a strong effort to throw off the pain this 
glimpse of his wife’s death-bed had brought upon him, and 
strove to enter into his brother’s anxiety. 

“ Have you no trace of her ? ” he questioned. 

“ None ; an old man who walked about the grounds saw 
her on the day of her discharge, sitting on a wharf, close by 
the walls of the hospital.” 

“ With her child?” 

“ She took no child with her, he said, but sat in that one 
spot till night. From that time I have lost all trace of her.” 

“ Have you ever questioned Mrs. Judson?” 

“ I did ; telling her all the facts, and claiming my wife at 
her hands.” 

“Well?” 

“ At first, she refused to answer me ; but when I told her 
of our marriage, she admitted everything, but persisted in 
stating that Louisa died in the hospital and was buried from 
her house, the servants believing that she had been brought 
home from a Catholic school. She w T as very anxious that I 
should keep my marriage and the manner of my wife’s death 
a secret ; and up to this time I have done so.” 

“ May not this possibly be true ? ” inquired George De 
Marke, with sudden animation. 

“ No ; I have searched the wards and traced all the facts. 
It is useless to guess what Mrs. Judson’s motives for conceal- 
ment are; but it was Catharine Lacy who was taken from 
the hospital after her death, by an undertaker, and carried 
in the night to Mrs. Judson’s house, from which there w T as 
a pompous funeral the next day. The undertaker showed 
me his certificate for burial, but said that he had never seen 
the lady, as all the bills were paid by one of the nurses at 
the hospital.” 

“ Did you find this nurse ? ” 

“ No ; she left the hospital about that time, and I could 
get no intelligence regarding her.” 


The Female Miser in her Den . 317 

“ Did you question Mrs. Judson about her niece, my wife? ” 
inquired George, still disturbed by a vague hope.” 

“ Yes ; but she denied all knowledge of her whatever.” 

“ It is a sad mystery,” sighed George, falling into deeper 
dejection from that one gleam of hope. “ The fate of my 
poor wife seems to be certain, and it is impossible that yours 
could have been living without leaving some sure trace of 
her existence. She probably never came away from the 
wharf where that old man saw the darkness gathering around 
her. Deep water is a terrible temptation to persons driven 
to despair, as she was.” 

Louis De Marke arose and began to walk the room. 
George took his hat and went into the street. Neither of the 
young men had the heart for any further conversation that 
day. 



CHAPTER LX 


THE FEMALE MlSER IN HER DEN. 

P EG — Peg, don’t you hear me, Peg! I am tired and so 
hungry, Peg. Will no one give me drink or a mouth- 
ful to eat ? ” 

This oft-repeated complaint was answered by a hoarse 
croak from the small hen-coop that stood on the floor, and 
three lank chickens thurst forth their open bills and with- 
ered, thin necks, through the upright bars of their prison, 
casting side-glances toward the old woman, whose face and 
hands drooped over the side of the bed. 

The sound of this response, which came from the half 
famished creatures like the croak of so many hungry ravens, 
brought tears to the sick woman’s eyes, for these dumb suf- 
ferers had been her companions so long, that all the sympa- 


318 


The Female Miser in her Den. 


thies of which she was capable went out from her own 
forlorn state to theirs. But these humanizing feelings were 
all driven away when Peg, the ungrateful cat, stole out from 
under her bed with a fragment of food in her jaws, which 
she carried to the tireless and unswept hearth, and devoured 
under the fierce, hungry gaze of her mistress, with the sly 
look and crouching air of an ungrateful thief as she was. 

The old woman was feeble from long illness, but nothing 
could quite overcome the bitter malice of her nature, and 
the sight nf her prime favorite caring for her own wants 
with cool selfishness, as if she had been human, quenched 
her tears in anger. 

She gathered herself up in the squalid bed, and shook her 
clenched hand fiercely at the feline reprobate, who, as if 
comprehending all the impotency of this rage, answered it 
with a greenish glare of the eyes, and a low, muffled growl 
over the food she was devouring. 

As the old woman fell back upon her pillow, shedding 
tears of imbecile rage, a knock came to the door, for the 
first time in many days. 

The cat listened a moment with her paws fastened greedily 
on the fragment of food, and her ears thrown back. The 
chickens drew in their lank necks and huddled together in 
the back of their little coop ; and the old woman cried out 
piteously, and yet with a tremor of rage in her voice, — 

“ Come in, whoever you are. Welcome, in the name of 
the blessed Virgin ! ” 

The door opened, and a woman entered the room firmly, 
and with the demeanor of one who had a right there. Her 
dress was very humble, and made after a fashion that had 
prevailed years before. A large bonnet of pink silk, now 
faded and crushed, was on her head ; a fall of discolored 
blonde lace, once very costly, half shaded her features ; and 
a mantilla of antique voluminousness fell over a dress of 
soiled calico. 


The Female Miser in her Den . 


319 


“ Who are you ? and what do you come for ? ” inquired 
Madame De Marke, striving to support herself on one elbow 
in the bed, while she shaded her eyes with the other hand. 
“ Has anybody heard that I was sick ? Why did n’t they 
send me a Sister of Mercy ? ” 

“ I am all the sister of mercy you ’ll be likely to get to 
take care of you in this world or the next,” replied her vis- 
itor, looking around the room with a smile of grim satisfac- 
tion. “All right! So you are sick and want help — hungry 
and want food. I like that. It goes a good way toward 
convincing me that there is a just God, and I don’t like to 
give up that idea altogether, though he did make such crea- 
tures as you are.” 

The old woman uttered a sort of hiss, and clenched the 
hand she had lost all strength to threaten with. 

“ I know you. Yes, yes ! I know you well enough now, 
Jane Kelly. Your time in State’s Prison is up, and you ’ve 
come here to insult me on my sick-bed. That ’s brave of 
you now, is n’t it ? — mighty brave ! ” 

“ I came here because I had no other home to go to, and 
because you owe me money that I will have : and I owe you 
punishment for all the wickedness you have heaped on me, 
which you are sure to get. It’s* settling-day between us.” 

“What do you want? What do you mean? I don’t 
owe you anything. I fiever did anything against you, Jane 
Kelly, never in my whole life. On the contrary, I always 
liked you, and when that impertinent policeman would take 
you up, and the judge insisted on sentencing you, I did my 
best to buy you off. It was all because you would n’t do all 
that we bargained for, that you fell into trouble. But you 
are a good-hearted creature, Jane, and won’t bear malice 
against a poor, harmless old woman for what she could n’t 
help. Come, take off your bonnet, Jane, and find a chair. 
I’m so glad you came.” 

Jane took off her bonnet, and revealed a crop of short, 


320 The Female Miser in her Den . 

black hair, which she shook at the old woman with a malig- 
nant laugh. 

“This is your doings ! ” she said, threading the thick 
locks fiercely with her fingers. “ It was a yard and a quar- 
ter long when you swore it off my head. Well, nevermind, 
every dog has its day, and mine is coming round with a 
sharp turn. Before this gets to its length again, you ’ll be 
six feet under ground, or where I just came from.” 

“Hush, now do hush,” pleaded the old woman, with a 
feeble attempt* at her old cajoling tone. “ Don’t talk about 
being six feet under ground. I ’m only a little weak, you 
know, and grieved at the ingratitude of the world. Just 
look there, Jane Kelly, my dear old friend ; look at Peg ; I 
would have staked anything on the faithfulness of that cat ; 
but ever since I ’ve been sick she ’s never been near my bed, 
but goes off mousing and stealing for herself, just as if I 
was n’t here and could n’t be hungry, I, who taught her the 
difference between cooked birds right from the restaurant 
and live mice. Would you believe it, ever since I’ve been 
unable to help myself, she ’s done nothing but catch mice.” 

There the old woman’s passion threw her into a coughing- 
fit, but the moment it was over, she began again. 

“ To-day, when she came with a bird dripping with gravy 
in her jaws, I tried to coax her up to the bed ; but no, there 
she stood leering at me with her round, glaring eye, and 
munched the bird up bones and all before my face. I tried 
to get at her, but the room turned black as midnight, and 
though I could hear her crunching and growling under the 
bed, it was of no use pleading. Look at her there, Jane 
Kelly, the viper that I warmed in my bosom, and if you 
wish to fight anything, try her, she deserves it. But I, — just 
come to the bed, my friend, take my hand, there’s nothing 
but kindness in me. I’m full of friendship for you. Sick- 
ness and trouble have changed me, Jane, and if I did you 
any harm, it has been repented of long and long ago.” 


The Female Miser in her Den. 321 

Jane scarcely seemed to heed all this, save that she went 
up to the hearth and gave Peg, the cat, a vigorous kick with 
one of the heavy prison-shoes that still encased her feet. 
This injunction to punish the cat seemed to be the only por- 
tion of the old woman’s speech that impressed her enough 
for action. Though it was very evident that the miserable 
old creature was absolutely suffering from starvation, Jane 
seemed in no hurry to relieve the discomforts of her posi- 
tion, but seated herself in one of the dilapidated chairs, and 
took a well-satisfied survey of the room, till her fierce gaze 
at last encountered the keen, black eyes of her enemy glan- 
cing upon her from the bed. 

“ So you have suffered a good deal ? ” she said, abruptly. 

“ A great deal. You w r ould be sorry for me, Jane, if you 
knew how much.” 

“ I ’m not sure about that. Hungry sometimes, eh ? ” 

“ I ’m hungry now ! ” answered the sick woman, while 
tears dropped like single hail-stones from her eyes ; “I’m 
very hungry, Jane Kelly.” 

“ And thirsty?” 

“ My mouth is parched for want of a drop of water ! ” 

“ And weak ? ” 

“ So weak that it troubles me to move a finger, except 
when I’m angry. Peg gave 'me a moment’s strength, and 
your coming kept it up — but now I am helpless.” 

“Yet you are rich ?'” 

“ Oh, yes, very rich ; rolling in gold — rolling in gold ! ” 
cried the old woman, with a fresh gleam of the eyes. 

“ And where is this gold ? I want my share of it.” 

“Your share, oh, ha! you’re joking now, my beautiful 
friend. Of course, one never keeps money in a place like 
this ! Safe in the bank, mortgages, railroad stock, bonds.’’ 

“And jewels perhaps — old-fashioned diamond ear-rings, 
mated this time,” said Jane Kelly, glancing under the bed, 
at v r hich Madame De Marke grew more livid than sickness 
20 


322 


The Female Miser in her Den . 


had left her, and began to writhe upon her pillow as if seized 
with a sudden paroxysm of pain. 

“ No, no,” the invalid almost shrieked, “ the judge kept 
them both. I never could get those ear-rings back from his 
clutches. They were to be kept for you, he insisted, when 
you came out of prison. I only wish we had them here, and 
they should sparkle in those pretty ears before you could 
find time to ask for them.” 

Jane gave her head a contemptuous toss, but the eyes of 
the old woman were fixed upon her with that keen, mesmeric 
power which in serpents is called fascination ; and spite of 
her coarse shrewdness, the material of the one woman was 
yielding itself to the diabolical subtlety of the other. 

“You must not complain of the prison, Jane Kelly, for 
it has made a lady of you. Why, your forehead and neck 
are white as lilies, and your cheeks are like wild roses, only 
when you look cross one loses sight of the dimples. It’s 
worth while staying between four stone walls a year or two, 
if it brings one’s beauty out like that ! ” 

“ Like this ! ” said Jane, with another wilful shake of the 
head, which sent the hair in disorder over her brow and 
temples. “ This is one of the beauties I have gained ! ” 

“ But it will be thicker and softer, and — ” 

The old woman broke off suddenly, and turned upon 
her pillow moaning. Jane Kelly arose with an impulse of 
compassion. 

“ What shall I dp for you?” she said. 

“ Something to eat, and a mouthful of water,” moaned the 
patient, wearily, “ I am almost dead ! ” 

“ Where shall I get food ?” inquired Jane. “Water I can 
find.” 

“Give me water — a little water — it costs nothing; give 
that first ! ” said the old woman, in a feeble moan, true to 
her great vice, even while hunger was gnawing at her vitals. 


Madame’ s Golden Crucifix . 


323 


CHAPTER LXL 


MADAME S GOLDEN CRUCIFIX, 


AXE took a broken pitcher from the table and went out 



ei in search of water. When she returned with the cool 
moisture dripping through the fracture over her hands, the 
sick woman aroused herself and sat up in the bed with out- 
stretched hands, and eager, gleaming eyes. As she drank, the 
chickens in the coop began to flutter wildly against each 
other, and dart their long necks through the bars with a 
hungry cackle, that made the sick crone laugh hysterically 
as she held the pitcher to her mouth. 

“ Give them some, poor dears, they want it badly. It 
costs nothing, so give them enough. It’s a dreadful thing 
to be thirsty,” said the poor woman, relinquishing the pitcher 
and drawing a deep, broken breath. 

Jane set the pitcher down before the hen-coop, and the 
poor creatures made a rush at it, darting their eager heads 
one over the other through the bars, and casting upturned 
glances as they threw back their bills to swallow the water 
for which they had been thirsting. The old woman turned 
herself over to the side of the bed and watched them with a 
look of keen enjoyment, working her withered and moist 
lips in sympathy with their tumultuous satisfaction, and 
talking to them in broken exclamations, as if they had been 
human beings. 

“Now,” said Jane Kelly; “tell me where I can get 
something to eat. You are starved almost to death, and I 
am about as well off — haven’t tasted a mouthful since 
yesterday.” 

“ Something to eat ? Oh, yes ! one can’t live without eat- 
ing, and that’s what makes life so expensive. If you had a 
little money now — ” 


324 


Madame’ s Golden Crucifix . 

“ Haven’t got a red cent in the world; that’s why I came 
here ! ” answered Jane, indignantly. “ Came a purpose for 
the gold you are rolling in, and mean to have it, too ! ” 

“ Oh ! ” sighed Madame De Marke, “ if I only had it here, 
you should n’t go away empty-handed.” 

“ I don’t intend to go away empty-handed, nor hungry 
either, so long as there is a box full of gold and diamonds 
under your bed, my fine old lady ! ” cried Jane, preparing 
to creep under the miserable cot on which Madame De 
Marke lay. 

A low, cracked laugh broke from the sick woman, as she 
felt the rather stout person of Jane Kelly striving to force 
itself between the crossed supporters of her couch in search of 
the box ; but she said nothing. When an oath bespoke the 
disappointment of her visitor, in not finding the object of 
her search, the old woman began to shiver with affright, for 
there was something fiendish in the sound. 

“Now,” said Jane Kelly, lifting herself fiercely from the 
floor, “you ’ll have the goodness, just for the novelty of the 
thing, to tell me where that box, with the iron bars in which 
you keep my ear-rings and somebody else’s gold, is hid 
away. I want that box, and I mean to have that box. Do 
you understand, my precious old Jezebel?” 

“ It’s in the bank. It’s been in the bank ever since that 
night ! ” 

“ That’s a lie ! ” answered Jane, sternly. 

“ On my soul, on my life! ” 

“Bah! your soul! your life! Why all the life in your 
miserable body is mine, if I choose to go away as other peo- 
ple would, and let you starve it out. A little Easterly in- 
activity, and where is. your life or soul either ? If I let one 
go, it ’ll take something more than a gold crucifix to save 
the other, let me tell you.” 

“Don’t be wicked, don’t be sacrilegious,” pleaded the 
poor woman, thrusting her hand under the pillow, and hold- 


Madame 9 s Golden Crucifix . 325 

ing fast to the crucifix she had concealed there. “ Don’t 
talk about letting me starve more than I have! If you 
only knew how horrible it is to call, and call, and call, with 
nothing but your own voice to come back from the empty 
rooms ; all night long, without a living soul within hearing, 
and all day long, with people moving about under your 
room, filling the building with life, and yet too far off for 
screams to reach them — oh! Miss Kelly, dear, dear Miss 
Kelly, don’t talk of leaving me to suffer all that over again!” 

“ Then tell me where the box of gold is ! ” 

“ I have told you. It is in the bank.” 

“ Give me an order to take it out then ! ” 

“I can’t. My hand is so feeble I can’t write. Give 
me something to eat. Nurse me up a little, and I ’ll do it 
for you in a minute. You know I would, Miss Jane!” 

Jane looked at the old creature with bitter scrutiny, and 
at last broke out, — 

“ I don’t believe you ! ” 

“ Oh ! how cruel you are. If I take my oath of it, will 
you believe me then ? ” 

“ Will you take it on the Bible ? ” 

“Yes, yes, on the Bible: — your Protestant Bible, if that 
will satisfy you ! ” 

“It won’t,” answered Jane. “What do you care fora 
Protestant Bible? I must have your oath on the crucifix, 
before I believe it.” 

“ The crucifix ! But I have n’t got a crucifix ! ” 

“ Where is the gold one you used to plot mischief over on 
your knees?” questioned Jane, sneeringly. 

“The gold one? The gold crucifix? Oh! yes, that is 
in that box, with all the other jewels. It was n’t safe here, 
"you know ! ” answered the old woman, clutching her fingers 
more tightly around her treasure, “ so you see I can t swear 
on the crucifix ; but I ’ll do it on anything else you like ! 

Jane had watched the sly movement of the old woman s 


326 


Madame’ s Golden Crucifix . 


hand, with all the sharp suspicion natural to her character. 
Without a word of reply, she drew close to the bed, seized 
the old woman’s wrist, and drew forth the skeleton hand 
still clutched upon the crucifix. 

“ Miserable old liar, what is this ? ” she cried, shaking the 
poor hand till the crucifix fell from its clutch. 

“ I don’t know,” answered the old woman, cowering down 
in the bed. “ It ’s my religion. It ’s my all in all. Don’t 
touch it.” 

“Bother!” exclaimed Jane, brutally seizing upon the 
crucifix and holding it up. “ Now swear on this, that you 
have put the gold and jewels in the bank, and I ’ll believe 
it. Come, sit up and swear. I ’ll hold it to your lips.” 

“ No, no. It ’s not allowed to swear about worldly mat- 
ters on that. Give me anything else, and I ’ll do it,” cried 
Madame, snatching at the crucifix. 

“ This, or nothing,” was the stern reply. 

“ Give me my crucifix. Oh ! lay it down. Give me my 
crucifix ! ” almost shrieked the old woman, with wild terror 
in her eyes, as she saw Jane walking backward toward the 
door, carry off her treasure. 

“No, no, I’m going to try what it can do; you have 
prayed to it for bread that did n’t come. I ’ll set it to work. 
See if I don’t get something to eat out of it.” 

“ Something to eat ? ” cried Madame De Marke, “ what ! 
my crucifix ! Where are you going ? ” * 

“ To my uncle’s ! ” 

“ You have no uncle. It will be lost, bring it back. I 
have a shiMing in the pocket of my dress — you shall have 
that, only give back the holy crucifix.” 

“ A shilling, indeed. My uncle will give me ten times the 
money if I spout it handsomely — but don’t fret, I ’ll bring 
you the ticket, on honor, and you can buy back your religion 
with some of the gold when it comes from the bank. Keep 
cool, old lady, it ’s my turn now.” 


Begging for Food . 327 

“ But yon will not carry off my crucifix ! ” screamed the 
old woman. 

“ Won’t I?” replied Jane, with a taunting laugh, “won’t 
I ? It may save you, but you can’t save it : here goes, my 
fine old lady.” 

Jane Kelly turned back to utter the last tormenting 
words, and left the old woman in a pitiable state of distress. 

“My crucifix, my crucifix, oh! she has carried off my 
soul. My strength is gone. The blessed mother of God has 
seen them carry off her son. I am nothing, I am crushed 
here in my own bed. She has given me over to purgatory, 
while there is breath in my body. I cannot live, and with- 
out the blessed crucifix I cannot die ! Woe, woe, they have 
left me at last, a poor, miserable, weak old woman.” 

Here the cracked voice broke into moans and unequal 
sobs, between which came forth the plaint of “ My crucifix 
— my crucifix ! ” 


CHAPTER LXII. 

BEGGING FOR FOOD. 

I K about half an hour, Jane Kelly returned with a basket 
of food upon her arm, and full of malicious cheerfulness. 
“ There, old woman, do you see this ? plenty to eat and a 
sharp appetite. When would that miserable old image have 
brought so much in your hands, I should like to know ? ” 

“ But where is my crucifix ? You have not sold it ? ” 
“No — no — spouted it, that ’s all.” 

“What do you mean? Who has got my crucifix?” 
shouted Madame, wild with terror and grief. 

“ A nice old Jew, who turned up his nose at your image, 
as if it had been a leg of pork ; would n’t believe it was 


328 


Begging for ■ Food. 


genuine gold at first, and made a reduction of twenty-five 
per cent, extra on the value, because of the insult I had of- 
fered in bringing the image to him. I told him you would 
redeem it with a thousand dollars, rather than lose it. A 
thousand dollars, you hear, old lady ! ” 

“A thousand dollars,” muttered Madame De Marke, 
turning to the wall with a stifled moan, “ a thousand dollars. 
This wicked wretch has ruined me ! ” 

i‘ Why, you old hypocrite, I could n’t take less. Did you 
expect me to make a Judas Iscariot of myself, and ask only 
thirty pieces of silver. I a’n’t so irreverent a creature as 
that, anyhow.” 

“ A thousand dollars ! ” moaned the old woman. 

“ Don’t fret about that, mother. The Jews a’n’t going to 
give more now than they did in old times ; the ticket says 
ten dollars ; the heathen would n’t raise another sixpence.” 

“Ten dollars — ten dollars — and all in her hands,” 
muttered the old woman, — “why, ten dollars will last me 
two months, and she ’ll use it up in a meal almost. Oh, if 
I were but strong and well ! ” 

“ But you a’n’t strong nor well either, so just make the 
best of it and stop whining. I ’m tired of it, let me tell 
you ! ” said J ane, peremptorily. “ Hush up, now, and not 
another whimper.” 

The old woman turned her face upon the pillow, and wept 
out her grief in silence; she dared not disobey her hard 
task-mistress. 

With a good deal of clatter and noise, Jane went about 
the room, kindling a fire from some charcoal she had brought 
in her basket, and setting out the broken dishes on the bottom 
of an old chair that had lost its back. An expression of 
almost fiendish satisfaction was on her face, adding to the 
repulsion which hardship and wickedness had already left 
there. She was evidently planning some new torture for 
the woman, who had so justly earned her vengeance. 


Begging for Food. 


329 


Directly, the charcoal began to crackle in a broken fur- 
nace ‘that stood within the fireplace, and the fumes of a fine 
beefsteak filled the chamber with an odor that had probably 
never visited it before. 

The famished old woman grew restless under this rich 
perfume. Her eyes gleamed, her fingers worked eagerly 
among the bedclothes. At last she forgot the loss of her 
crucifix and every other pain, in the animal want thus 
keenly aroused. 

“Oh!” she said, snuffing up the fragrant smoke, as it 
floated over her, “ how delicious it is ! How I long for a 
mouthful. Jane Kelly, dear Jane Kelly, make haste. No 
matter if it is underdone — I like beefsteak any way. Just 
one mouthful, on a fork, Jane, while you cook the rest ! ” 

Jane Kelly laughed, and turned over the steak, pressing 
it beneath her knife till the juice ran out upon the coals, 
filling the room afresh with its appetizing fumes. 

“ What are you laughing at? ” cried the old woman, break- 
ing into hysterical muttering. “I ask for a mouthful of 
steak and you laugh ! ” 

“ I laugh, of course I do ! Is there any law against laugh- 
ing, let me ask? — anything immoral in it? because I ’m 
getting rather particular on that point, since I handled the 
crucifix. Why should n’t I laugh, Madame De Marke ? ” 

“Oh ! you should. Why not? I could laugh myself at 
the thoughts of our supper. I could — I, I ’m laughing. 
Come, come, be quick. I want something to eat. I am 
dying for something to eat ! ” Here the old woman struggled 
up in bed, and held out her arms, working her lean fingers 
eagerly, like the claws of a hungry parrot. 

“Well, I hope you may get it!” said Jane, cruelly, “I 
hope you may get it ! ” 

“What! what do you mean?” faltered the poor woman, 
falling helplessly back on her pillow, with a look of pale 
horror. “ What do you mean ? ” 


330 


Begging for Food. 


“ 1 mean just what I say. That I hope you may get some- 
thing to eat ; for if you have one mouthful from me, it ’ll be 
paid for, I tell you ! ” answered Jane, with brutal satisfaction. 

The poor woman uttered a faint moan, and the gleam of her 
hungry eyes was quenched in tears of cruel disappointment. 

“ Oh ! this is too wicked — you will not be so fiendish, 
Jane Kelly. If a mad dog, who had bitten you, were as 
hungry as I am, you would give him something to eat ! ” 

“ Yes, of course I should. One cannot hate a brute beast 
enough to starve it to death. Besides, they do not lock each 
other up for false swearing. Oh, yes ! I would give a piece 
of this steak to a hungry dog — or a hungry cat either. 
Here, Peg, Peg, come here, Peg ! ” 

As she spoke, Jane cast off a fragment of the steak, and 
held it up at a tantalizing height above the eager cat, who 
mewed, and leaped, and quivered all over with impatience, 
to seize upon it. 

Madame De Marke watched the contest with gleaming eyes. 
When she saw the fragment fall, to be pounced upon by the 
voracious cat, a sharp yell broke from her, and she cried out 
with the pang of a mother over her ungrateful child. 

“ Oh ! oh I how she devours it, while I am starving. Peg, 
oh ! misery, Peg, how can you?” Again Jane Kelly burst 
into an unfeeling laugh. 

“How much will you give now, old lady,” she said, “for 
a piece of steak, like that which poor, dear, grateful Peg is 
tearing with her claws ? ” 

“How much will I give? Oh! if I had thousands here, 
you should have them — only for the least mouthful. But 
you have taken my all ! ” cried the old woman, piteously. 

“ Tell me where the box of gold and jewels is, and I’ll give 
you some,” replied Jane, flinging another piece of steak to 
the cat, and preparing to seat herself before the broken plat- 
ter, on which she had placed the larger portion. 

“ The box ? The box ? Oh, I have told you. In the 
bank. I sent it there ! ” was the affrighted answer. 


331 


Begging for Food . 

Jane divided the steak before her, and tearing out the 
heart of a white loaf with her hand, began to eat. 

“ Oh, Jane Kelly ! how can you? Have pity, have pity. 
I am so hungry, Jane Kelly ! ” 

“ Of course you are, so is Peg; so am I, and the poor chick- 
ens too!” answered Jane, rising with her mouth full, and 
playfully aiming fragments of bread at the open bars of the 
hen-coop. “ It *s human nature to be hungry.” 

“ Oh ! it ’s against nature. I shall perish with hunger — 
with enough to eat all around me, every living thing mocks 
my want. See them eat ! see them eat ! the greedy, ungrate- 
ful wretches — see them ! and I starving, starving, starving ! ’» 

The poor woman made a desperate effort to spring up and 
seize the food before her; but her head reeled, her limbs 
quivered, and darkness filled her eyes instead of tears. She 
fell back upon the bed with an impatient cry of anguish, 
which was rendered hideous-- by the eager munching of the 
cat and the satisfied chuckle of the hens, — all too busy with 
their own wants for any thought of her. 

“ Come, come ! f * said Jane, more feelingly, “ tell me where 
the box is, and you shall have a beautiful meal ! ” 

“ I cannot, I cannot ! ” moaned the old lady, — “ ask any- 
thing else, and I will. Do ! ” 

“ That box, with the iron clamps. Nothing more, nothing 
less, tell me where it is ! ” 

“ In the bank. I have told you.” 

“ It is here. I will have it within an hour, whether you 
tell me or not. But if I am obliged to search for it, the 
fiends may feed you if they will — not a mouthful shall you 
have from me! 

“ Oh ! cruel, cruel. What can I say ? how shall I move 
you?” 

“ Tell wdiere the box is ! ” 

“ I cannot — I do not know. It is at the bank — in the 
bank.” 


332 


The Iron-Bound Box. 


CHAPTER LXIII. 

THE IRON-BOUND BOX. 

J ANE KELLY sat down resolutely and went on with 
her supper. The old woman watched each mouthful 
that she swallowed, with working lips and eyes that grew 
fiercer and larger each moment. 

“ Oh, mother of heaven, I shall die ! ” she sobbed out at 
last, throwing her flail-like arms over her head. “ Give me 
something to eat — give me something to eat, or I will tear 
you — tear you in pieces ! ” 

Jane lifted her face and looked composedly on this burst 
of agony. Then without a word she went on with her meal. 
When she saw this, tears began to stream over the old wo- 
man’s face ; when she heard Madame De Marke pleading 
piteously for a single crumb of the bread, or one little mouth- 
ful of the steak — “ One crumb, one mouthful, she would be 
content with that,” Jane still never spoke, but enjoyed her 
meal in stubborn silence. 

“ Do you hear ? — oh ! Jane, do you hear me ? ” 

“ Y es, I hear ! ” 

“One mouthful, only one mouthful, dear, good Jane ! ” 

“ The box, only the box, dear, good madam ! ” was the 
mocking answer. 

“ Oh ! will nothing but the box answer? Am I to starve?” 
“ If I am obliged to find it for myself, you certainly will 1 ” 
said Jane, resolutely pushing back the chair from which 
she had been eating. “ Now for a grand search ! ” 

Her eyes accidentally fell on the hen-coop, as she spoke, 
and Madame De Marke, struck with terror, called out, — 
“No, no, do not disturb the poor things; they have done 
nothing ! ” 

A suspicion instantly seized upon Jane. She advanced 


The Iron-Bound Box. 333 

toward the coop, and stooping down was about to remove it 
from its place. 

“ No, no, stop, I will tell you, Jane. Give me something 
to eat first, and I will tell you about it.” 

“ Tell me first ! ” persisted Jane, with her eyes on the hen- 
coop, “ tell me where the box is, first ! ” 

“ Will you give me food if I do ? ” 

“ Yes, as much as you can eat.” 

“ Now ? — at once ? ’* 

“ Yes, this minute ! ” 

“ But what do you want of my gold ? ” 

“No matter ! ” 

“You will not take much; enough to redeem the crucifix 
— no more than that?” 

“ Speak, or I will find it without your help.” 

It seemed as if the struggle between habitual parsimony 
and the sharp demands of hunger would never cease to rend 
that poor skeleton form. The old woman writhed upon her 
bed, in absolute torture, yet her mercenary soul clung to 
its gold against the very pangs of hunger. At last she 
shrieked out, — 

“ Give me food. Give me life, but do not take all ! ” 

“ Where is the box ? ” persisted Jane, steady to her point. 
“ There, there ! ” cried her victim, “ remove the coop. 
Under it is a loose board — beneath that you will find the 
box.” As she ceased, the old woman fell to weeping and 
moaning over her losses. 

Jane removed the coop, thrust aside a loose board, and 
found the box between the floor and ceiling. 

“ All right. Give up the key, old lady ! ” 

Madame held out a key, which had been concealed in her 
bosom, weeping bitterly all the time. 

Jane opened the box, pushed aside the gold with her 
hand, and took out the tarnished jewel-case. 

“ I will not rob you, these are mine,” she said, thrusting 


334 


The Brothers Consult Again. 

the case into her bosom ; “ and this,” she continued, taking 
out a slip of paper ; “ this belongs to one we have both 
wronged. Take your money, I have got all that is mine ! ” 

“ Give me the gold — here, here, on the bed. Give it up, 
my gold ! my gold ! ” 

The old creature forgot even tile pangs of hunger, in the 
sudden relief produced by the words of her enemy. She 
“••grasped out handsful of the gold, and hugging it between 
her thin palms, kissed it eagerly before she would thrust it 
back to the box again. A moment before she had thought 
it all lost, now she was laughing hysterically, and shedding 
feeble tears over what had been saved. 

“ Here is your supper ! said Jane, drawing the broken 
chair forward, and holding up the plate of food; “here is 
your supper ! ” 

The gold dropped from her shrivelled hands. For one 
moment hunger grew strong over avarice; she seized the 
offered food with one hand, and directly began groping after 
the gold with the other. 

While she was thus employed, Jane Kelly left the room. 


CHAPTER LXIV. 

THE BROTHERS CONSULT AGAIN. 

T HE two brothers sat together in Louis De Marke’s room. 

Both seemed anxious and thoughtful. George had a 
look of habitual sadness upon his face ; but Louis was like 
one who struggles against fate without the resolution to 
brave it. 

“ Go to her, George, go, I entreat you,” said the latter, 
“for I dare not, I cannot. Tell her the simple truth, say 
that in doubt of my position, sometimes almost forgetting it 


335 


The Brothers Consult Again . 

in the magnitude of my great love for her, I looked and 
acted as no honorable man should have done, bound as I 
was. True, I never spoke of love, and in this sometimes 
strove to satisfy my conscience ; hut words are the weakest 
confessions that a man can make ; and nothing but a coward 
shelters his honor under the miserable pretence, that a pas- 
sion uttered in every action and look is unspoken, if not 
syllabled in so ’many words. 

“ I loved this woman in her girlhood — hopelessly, for she 
married another. But even in look, or gesture, it was un- 
expressed. Then my poor Louisa came as a more solemn 
barrier against this passion, came and vanished like a 
troubled shadow, leaving me desolate and a wanderer on 
the face of the earth. I came home; I found Townsend 
Oakley dead, and the woman I had so worshipped a widow, 
free as air, more beautiful than ever, and ready to renew 
her acquaintance with me as the dearest of her early friends. 

“ It was wrong, I know it, George, but how could I resist 
the happiness of seeing her ? How force myself to repel the 
dawning favor that I found in her eyes? I did not speak — 
thus appeasing conscience with mental craft. But she 
must have known how madly I loved her, and, conceal it as 
I may, it was the very delirium of joy that J felt whenever 
an unconscious proof escaped her, that her own warm heart 
answered back the passion burning so fatally in mine. 

“ During the winter, this intimacy continued. In the 
spring the young widow, in pursuance of a plan laid out 
by her husband before his death, completed a pretty cottage 
on Staten Island, near the sea-shore, and retired there with 
her little boy.” 

“She had a child then?” interrupted George, with interest. 

“ One of the loveliest children that you ever set eyes on, 
so bright, so incapable of being spoiled, my heart leaped 
toward the child the moment I saw him ! ” 

George remained thoughtful, while Louis walked up and 
down the room, excited and restless. 


336 


The Brothers Consult Again. 


“ It is strange, if your wife is living,” said George, at last, 
“ that no traces of her can be found. Have you searched 
since we talked of this before ? ” 

“Everywhere, and in vain. This is the misery of my 
position ! ” answered Louis, passionately. “ If she could be 
found, a sense of duty would give me strength ; I could 
struggle against this fascination ; but with this dull blank 
of uncertainty before me, I have no power to wrestle with 
myself.” 

“We are both in a terrible position,” said George, “ but 
we must act as honest men, and trust God for the rest. You 
are right, Louis. Leave this country at once. Let me con- 
tinue the search for Louisa. If I find her, we will join you 
in any country you may wish. If all search proves vain, 
she is doubtless dead.” 

“ Yes, I will go. Oh ! George, but for you I should never 
have found strength to leave her, and encounter the desert 
of existence before me. Yes, I will go !” 

The resolution was uttered with a gesture of dull despair ; 
and he added, “ I must go, or more evil will come of this ! ” 

“ It is best,” answered George, pressing a hand to his fore- 
head, as if to still some pain there. “ But that I can serve 
you better here, we would go together. All places are alike 
to me now ! ” 

Louis sat down by his brother. Tears stood in his fine 
eyes, and dusky shadows settled beneath them. 

“ Y ou will see her, George, see her in all her serene love- 
liness ; you will sit by her side, talk with her — talk of me 
— of my weakness. ' She is gentle, and will not think my 
love for her a crime. You will tell her that I have been 
married — married^to her husband’s sister, who may be alive, 
or who may be in her grave — I know that you will deal 
with my name in brotherly kindness. But do not let her 
despise me; tell her how much it cost me to abandon every- 
thing for a hard duty. Deal kindly with me, brother, for 
my heart is almost breaking ! ” 


337 


The Brothers Consult Again. 

George threw his arms around his brother, and drew him 
close to the honest heart so full of compassion for his troubles 

“ Take courage, Louis. All will end well. I will not 
rest till this mystery is solved. In a few months I will find 
your wife, or bring you proofs of her death;” 

“And must I go at once?” said Louis, looking wistfully 
into his brother’s face. “Why must I leave my native land? 
The very air she breathes is precious to me.” 

George smiled compassionately. 

“ It is far better, Louis, that you should be away. How 
could you be content without seeing her?” 

“ True, true. I will go ! Everything is packed. A few 
hours, and the steamer sails. In that time we shall be sep- 
arated, perhaps for years, brother.” 

“ No, no, I will join you.” 

“ You have a weary search first. I have tried it.” 

“ Not as I shall, with coolness and decision. You were 
I too much interested. Trust me.” 

“ I do, in all things.” 

“ And you will go to-night.” 

“Yes, to-night,”* was the mournful answer. 

“Have you taken leave of Madame?” 

“ No; when I called at her room, a few days since, she was 
gone. Somewhere in the country the people below stairs 
told me, and might not be back for months.” 

“ It is strange,” said George; “ her life, I find, has become 
utterly degraded. The den which she inhabits is the most 
poverty-stricken place I ever saw. She seemed greatly an- 
noyed at seeing me, and refused all conversation. The most 
that I could obtain from her was complaints of your unduti- 
fulness and prodigality.” 

“ Don’t talk of her, George. She is my mother, and I 
can only say with Hamlet, ‘ Would it were not so ! ’ but you 
will see her, and explain my sudden departure in the best 
way possible.” 

21 


338 


The Washerwoman’s Intrusion . 


“Yes, I will see her. Not only for that, blit because I 
believe she is in some way involved in this mystery regarding 
the young creatures so fatally connected with us.” 

“ She denies it positively.’’ 

“ This may be true in all else. But I know that her per- 
secution drove Catharine to the hospital.” 

“ I do not doubt it. But she never knew Louisa. Be- 
sides, I do not think she would deliberately wound me — her 
own son.’’ 

“We will not urge the question further,” answered George, 
suppressing the indignation that arose in his heart against 
his enemy. “She is a woman, and your mother.” 

“ True, true, so let us talk more directly of ourselves, for 
we have but an hour.” 


CHAPTER LXY. 

THE WASHERWOMAN’S INTRUSION. 

A LIGHT knock came to the door, which softly opened, 
and a woman appeared bearing a long basket full of 
clean linen on her arm. 

“ I hope I’m not too late for yer honor,” she said, placing 
her basket on a chair, and wiping the perspiration from her 
face. “ It’s a long walk from yon, and, do what I would, 
the time went by quicker ’an I ever seed it.” 

“ But you were to have brought the clothes home yester- 
day,” said George, annoyed by this intrusion upon the pre- 
cious moments which remained before his brother’s depar- 
ture. “ Usually you are more punctual, Mrs. Dillon.” 

“ True for ye there,” answered our old friend, Mary Mar- 
garet, while a crimson blush reddened her good-natured face. 
“ But do ye see, gintlemen, I’ve been away for a bit, 


The Washer iv Oman’s Intrusion . 


339 


looking after a darlint of a little boy as is precious to me 
as my own flesh and blood, though he is a gintleman now 
entirely — for all he was born side by side wid Terry in the 
hospital — more blame to them as sent his poor mother 
there ! ” 

There was something in this speech that made the brothers 
start. Their own minds had been so occupied by recollec- 
tions of the hospital, that the subject, brought upon them so 
suddenly, and from this unexpected source, seemed like a 
revelation. 

“ Of what child do you speak, Mrs. Dillon ? ” inquired 
George, while Louis stood with his wild eyes fixed upon her. 

“ Why, of me own little nursling, to be sure, as was born 
the week after little Terry, and took the bit and sup wid 
him, side by side, after his poor dead mother was took out 
of the ward in her pine coffin.” 

“And how old is little Terry?” asked Louis, abruptly. 

“ How old is little Terry ? Faix, and I can tell ye to a 
day, yer honors,” said the washerwoman, counting the plump 
fingers of one hand, which she held up with the thumb pro- 
truding. “D’ye see these? Just add two months an’ ten 
daj^s to that same, and ye have little Terry, the spalpeen, 
all to nothing, yer honors ! ” 

The young men turned their eyes from the plump hand 
and gazed with a sort of awe upon each other. A rapid 
calculation ran through the mind of each. Mary Margaret 
had pointed out the day upon which Louisa’s last letter was 
dated. 

“ And what became of the mother, that her little boy 
should have been given to you ? ” inquired George, almost 
holding his breath with anxiety. 

“She died, poor crather. I see her draw the last gasp 
myself, and helped to straighten out her poor limbs. A naiter 
corpse I never saw. She was more natural than any wax 
image in a museum.” 


340 


The Washerwoman’s Intrusion . 


« And wliat was her name?” asked Louis, turning pale 
as the question left his lips. 

“ I don’t well know, yer honor. They goes by numbers, 
not by names, in the hospital ; and sometimes she muttered 
over one name, sometimes another, till it was hard to get 
the rights of it. Besides, she never said nothin’ about her- 
self, only when she was out ov her head, as ye may say, wid 
the pain and trouble.” 

“ But you heard her mention some name, surely ? ” said 
Louis. 

“ Yes, and more ’an onee, yer honor. First it was Mrs. 
Judson ; then Barton; then Oakley; and then it was De 
Marke — that was the last word as ever left her poor lips.” 

The brothers looked at each other again, and both grew 6 
pale as death. 

“ I thought it strange more ’an once, for there was two on 
’em, and ye may well say they was both beauties, a-laying 
side by side — and when the fever was on ’em, this De Marke 
was on the tongue of one as well as t’other. You ’d a thought 
they both knowed something about the man as bore that 
name.” 

Louis De Marke went close to George, and leaned on his 
shoulder. George felt that he was trembling from head to 
foot, and drew him toward the sofa. “ Let me question her,” 
he said, in a low voice, “ the thing involves us both ! ” 

Mary Margaret, who had been sorting the linen from her 
basket while she was speaking, now turned, and her eyes I 
fell on the young men. She saw how pale they were, and j 
stopped in some bewilderment. 

“ I will go,” she said, taking up her basket. “ The old 
man is right ; my tongue is always too fast for my teeth ; 
what had I to do talking of sich to young gentlemen as 
knows nothing about ’em ? ” 

“ Stay, Mrs. Dillon ! ” said George, “ we are both inter- j 
ested, deeply interested; tell us more about these young 


The Washerwoman’s Intrusion. 341 




persons ; we were taken by surprise and did not hear dis- 
tincty. Did one or both of these poor ladies recover?” 

Mary Margaret sat down with the basket upon her knees. 

“ Was it one, or both, ye asked? Arrah, but I wish it 
was both, that I could tell ye of ; but I saw one poor crathur 
carried out in a wooden coffin, wid two breadths of factory 
cotton on her for a shroud, and for all that she looked like 
a marble image, wid the raven black hair parted on her 
white for’ed, and the lids folded so could-like over her eyes, 
that had been black as stars and as bright as dimints.” 

“ Black eyes ? Did you say that the poor girl who died 
had black eyes and hair?” exclaimed Louis. 

“ Black as midnight, yer honor, eyes and hair — more, by 
the token, I closed them two eyes mysel’, and the color sunk 
into my heart ! ” 

The young men looked at each other almost wildly. 

“ This is very strange ! ” said George. 

The lips of the younger brother were white as marble, 
and when he tried to answer, they gave forth no sound. 

“ And the one who lived ? ” said George, with increasing 
agitation, — was she dark like the other?” 

“ Dark, did ye say ? Why, her hair was like burning 
gold, and her eyes — the bluest bit of sky ye ever saw was 
nothing to ’em. Thin her face, it was white as a lily wid a 
taste of red just in the mouth and cheeks. She looked like 
a born beauty in spite of the narrow bed and checkered cov- 
ering, the day I went out of the hospital, and followed me 
with her great lovin’ eyes all the way down the ward, as if 
she knew I was the friend to stand by her.” 

“ But you left her alive ?” said George, growing more and 
more excited. 

“ In course I did ! ” 

“And had no proofs of her death after?” 

“ Proofs, yer honor ? What proofs could I have of her 
death, when she came her own self to my home, after that, 


342 


The Washerwoman’ s Intrusion . 


and slept in the same bed wid the childer for a whole month, 
to say nothing of the strange baby, as the other poor crathur 
left ahint her.” 

“Stop ! ” said George, starting up with a flush upon his 
forehead, while his whole frame quivered with excitement. 

“ Be careful what you say. A mistake in this matter would 
be madness to us both. Are you sure, my good woman, 
quite sure, that the fair girl came forth alive from that hos- 
pital, and that the other died there ? ” 

“ Quite sure ? Faix and I am, if one’s own blessed eyes 
are to be trusted. Did n’t I straighten one out for her coffin, 
and nurse the other into life when she lay at death’s door — 
to say nothin’ of the bit of a baby ! ” 

“ One word more, Mrs. Dillon. Do try and remember. 
Did either of these young creatures ever call each other by 
name in your hearing ? ” 

“Faix, and they mentioned a good many names, I’m 
thinking, especially the fair one ; but they seemed to mane 
nothing.” 

“ But among those names was that of George or Louis 
ever mentioned ? ” 

“ Agin and agin, yer honors ; but it was in the fever, not 
atween themselves.” 

Louis De Marke buried his face in his hands, and George 
walked hurriedly back and forth in the room. The latter 
made one or two efforts to speak, but broke off as if the 
questions at his heart were too momentous. At last he drew 
close to Mary Margaret: — 

“ Where did she go from your house ? Where is she now ? ” 

His eyes were fixed almost wildly upon her ; he trembled 
from head to foot. 

“ I don’t know, yer honor. An old lady, wid the queerest 
bonnet on ye ever seed, took her away somewhere into the 
country, or foreign parts maybe ; and the baby was carried s 
off by a gintleman as wanted a son, and so took the darlint 


The Washer ivoman’ s Intrusion. 


343 


to make an heir of him, and maybe a king one of these 
days — the Lord be praised, for he was a beauty all over. ,, 

George walked unsteadily to his seat, and sat down with 
a low groan. Her words had wrung his heart with the 
most bitter disappointment. 

“And this is all you know?” he said, faintly. 

Margaret looked at him with her kind eyes, and answered 
that she could remember nothing more. 

“ And this young person, the fair one, I mean, did she 
never mention her name to you in all that time ? ” inquired 
Louis. 

“I disremember, yer honor. We called her the darlint 
at home : but it seems to me that she once told the old man 
that her name was Catharine, or the like of that ! ” 

“ Catharine ! ” broke from the lips of both the young men, 
and actuated by one impulse, each grasped the hand of the 
other. 

Mary Margaret arose to go. That moment a servant 
knocked at the door. All was ready for the journey, which 
Louis had forgotten. 

The brothers looked at each other in surprise, as if the 
idea of separation had just arisen. 

“ No, I will not leave my native land till this mystery is 
explained,” said Louis, in answer to his brother’s anxious 
look. 

The servant went outj^ Mary Margaret gathered up her 
basket and disappeared with him, leaving the brothers alone. 

“ She lives, I am certain that Catharine lives,” exclaimed 
George, sinking down upon the sofa, and gazing at the pale 
face of his brother through a mist of joyful tears. 

Louis could not answer, for in his heart there was a wild 
struggle. Self-reproach, regret, and a thousand tender mem- 
ories of his wife, struggled hard with another image that 
rose, spite of himself, amid these sad memories, leaving him 
in a state of strange excitement. 


344 


A Domestic Storm. 


At last George became more composed. 

“ Now,” he said, “ we have the world before us. Let there 
be no rest till all this strange story is put into proof.” 

Louis arose. 

“ I am ready, brother.” Then, with a burst of natural 
sorrow, which was not in the least incompatible with the 
feelings we have just described, his eyes filled with tears, and 
he exclaimed, with a world of regret in his voice, — 

“ My poor, poor wife ! ” 


CHAPTER LXVI. 

A DOMESTIC STORM. 

M OTHER,” said Mrs. Townsend Oakley, lifting her eyes 
gently from the needlework with which she was em- 
ploved, “ why was it that you took so strong a dislike to the 
DeMarkes?” 

Mrs. Judson lifted her eyes to the face of her daughter, 
and kept them upon it so long that a burning crimson spread 
over the fair cheeks and forehead. 

“ Why did I dislike the family, daughter ? Because the 
woman who called herself the head was in every respect un- 
worthy.” 

“ But the son, mother, surely he was a gentleman.” 

“ He was a villain ? ” answered Mrs. Judson, with a degree 
of sternness that made her daughter start, and brought a 
deluge of fiery blood to her face. 

“ How ? Why, mother, I never heard a word against him 
in my life before ! ” 

“ Probably not ; but had you searched deep enough, acts, 
rather than opinions, would have settled the truth of what I 
say. Your husband’s sister died in a charity hospital. He 
it was who sent her there.” 


A Domestic Storm. 


345 


“ Mother, mother ! ” 

The poor young woman gasped for breath. She could no 
longer syllable the words that rose to her lips, but with a 
faint struggle fell back insensible in her chair. 

Mrs. Judson arose with a heavy frown, and bent over her 
child. All of human feeling that she possessed was centred 
in her, and this sudden indisposition terrified her more from 
its cause than in itself. With trepidation she wheeled the 
easy-chair close to an open window and sprinkled the pale 
face with water. The effect was rapid. After a moment the 
white eyelids began to tremble, and the young widow fell into 
a fit of bitter weeping. 

“ My child — my child, what is this ? ” exclaimed Mrs. 
Judson, in a voice that betrayed the struggle of affright, ten- 
derness, and severity going on in her bosom. 

“Nothing, mother. You were so abrupt in telling me of 
poor Louisa : even now I do not understand it. I knew that 
Catharine Lacy, my own cousin, was in a hospital, and per- 
haps died there; but Louisa, indeed I can hardly believe it.” 

“It was the truth, though.” 

“ But, mother, Townsend always thought she died at your 
house.” 

“How was I to tell him otherwise? He would always 
have censured me for leaving her with the servants, — he 
would never have believed that a creature so young could 
have outwitted us all, and concealed herself, even in the 
greatest extremities, up to the very day of her death. She 
was dead, and I informed him of the fact. The particulars 
would have aggravated his grief.” 

“And how did you learn these particulars, mother?” 
asked the widow, with a degree of self-control that kept her 
face white as snow. 

“ I saw her myself, in the hospital.” 

“ You saw her? She told you this with her own lips?” 

“ She was dead and in her coffin.” 


346 


A Domestic Storm. 


“ But you saw her and took her away then ? ” 

“ I saw and recognized her ; she was buried from my house, 
and with that funeral the shameful secret died.” 

“Poor, poor girl; how Townsend did love her!” sobbed the 
widow. “ It would have broken his heart.” 

“ So I thought,” said the mother, smoothing the folds of 
her dress with feelings of deep self-satisfaction ; “ it was far 
better to keep him in ignorance. But for your mention of 
that young reprobate, I should not have distressed you or 
myself by speaking of it.” 

Mrs. Oakley shrunk back with a shudder as He Marke 
was thus alluded to, but gathering up courage, proceeded with 
the subject. 

“ But what proofs have you that he was to blame, mother? ” 

“ It was conclusive. He it was that deluded her away 
from my protection, he told me so himself.” 

“ But,” said the widow, looking suddenly up, while a gleam 
of light kindled the tears that filled her eyes, “he may have 
been married to her ! ,J 

“Yes,” answered the mother sharply, “and he may have 
been to Catharine Lacy at the same time.” 

Mrs. Judson drew a small embroidered portfolio from . 
her pocket, and springing the gold clasp, took from among 
other documents a copy of the letter which Jane Kelly had 
found in the prayer-book, and which so long after had 
reached Louis He Marke. 

Mrs. Oakley reached forth her hand with an effort, and 
nerved herself to read the letter through. Her face grew 
paler and paler as she proceeded ; the tears crowded to her 
eyes, and spite of all her efforts, the letter quivered like a 
dry leaf in her grasp. At last she looked sadly up at her 
mother. 

“And did they both die with his name upon their lips? ” 

“ It is the usual infatuation,” answered Mrs. Judson, bit- 
terly, but evading the direct question. 


A Domestic Storm. 


347 


“But the child, poor Louisa’s child, what became of that? ” 

Spite of her self-command, Mrs. Judson shrunk from the 
question. She had never inquired regarding this child, and 
a sensation of shame crept over her as she admitted the 
fact. 

“ Then you do not know if it is dead or living?” inquired 
Mrs. Oakley, in a low, grave voice, which fell upon the 
proud woman’s ear like a rebuke, which she was instantly 
ready to resent. 

“ Did you expect me to drag proofs of our own disgrace 
before the world, Mrs. Townsend Oakley ? ” 

The widow arose, her cheeks flushed and her lips quivering. 

“ I will search for this child. If it is alive, God will per- 
mit me to make atonement,” she said, gently. 

That instant little Edward entered the room. The curls 
were blown back from his broad forehead, and his eyes 
sparkled ; he had caught a great painted butterfly, and held it 
up in triumph. The attitude, the curve of his bright lips, the 
whole face, struck both these women with one thought, and 
their eyes met. A sudden and dark frown swept over the 
face of Mrs. Judson, while the daughter grew still and white, 
as if all the blood in her veins had turned to snow. 

“You need uot search far,” said Mrs. Judson, pointing 
her finger at the child, “ he came from the institution.” 

Mrs. Oakley slowly approached the boy. Her hands 
trembled violently as she put back his hair, and a spasm of 
pain shot through her as the boy sprang up, and locking his 
arms over her neck, attempted to surprise her with his eager 
kisses. 

“Who made you cry, mamma? — who made you cry?” 

“No one, darling,” said the widow, struggling against the 
recoil of her own heart, but forced, as it were, to unclasp his 
little hands. 

The boy drew back, and his bright lips began to quiver. 

“ I have lost the butterfly,” he sobbed, regretfully, follow- 


348 


A Domestic Storm. 


ing the gossamer wings, as they floated away, with his eyes ; 
“ and now my own mamma don’t care about my kisses! ” 

“ She does — she does ! ” cried the widow, sinking to her 
knees, and winding her arms around the child. “ The better, 
all the better, if these dear eyes are his. Ah, I knew ! I 
knew that there was some sweet mystery in a love that no 
mother ever felt more purely for her own child. Oh, it is 
everything to know that his life fills my arms, that I have 
fed and cherished it so long ! ” 

“Woman, what is this?” cried Mrs. Judson, stalking 
across the floor and laying her hand heavily on her daugh- 
ter’s shoulder ; “ are you raving mad ? Is it a De Marke 
you speak of? ” 

“Yes, mother,” said the widow, rising to her feet, but 
with the child’s hand in hers. “It is of a De Marke that I 
speak ; appearances may be against him, but I will not be- 
lieve him so wicked till the proofs are beyond contradiction. 
Louisa maybe dead; Catharine Lacy may be dead; but 
though their last acts and their last words accuse him, I will 
not believe them. Something of trouble and sorrow there 
may be, but nothing that should bring contempt upon an 
honorable man ! ” 

Mrs. Judson stood motionless, towering upright like a 
pillar of marble. Her voice was concentrated and hoarse; 
she made no gestures, but her eyes absolutely burned with 
indignation. 

“ And you know this De Marke ? ” 

“ Yes, mother, I know him ! ” 

“ Have seen him since your husband’s death, perhaps ? ” 

“ Yes, mother, often ! ” 

“ Here in this house, no doubt, where the widow came to 
bury her griefs ? ” 

Here the proud woman’s wrath blazed forth. Her hand 
was clenched ; her foot was half lifted from the floor, as if 
to spurn the widow and child from he* presence. 


The Wounded Bird. 


349 


“Here, I say, here yon may have received him, in a house 
consecrated to tears, under the roof which shelters your 
mother ! ” she continued, lifting her hoarse voice. 

The young widow stood pale and firm before all this 
wrath ; and the pretty child clung to her eagerly, following 
each motion of the haughty woman with his brave, bright 
eyes. 

“ It is true/’ she said, “ I have seen him here.” 

“ And you encourage him ? ” 

“ Mother, I love him ! ” 

The words were spoken unfalteringly, but with that gentle 
dignity that always accompanies truthful courage. The 
mother looked at her in white wrath. Her hand was slowly 
uplifted, her lips moved without uttering a sound, and with 
this mute malediction she left the room, and, in a few mo- 
ments, the house. 


CHAPTER LXVII. 


THE WOUNDED BIRD. 


HCE alone with the child, Mrs. Oakley gave way to the 



painful thoughts that crowded upon her. What right 
had she to feel these pangs of bitter jealousy regarding a man 
who had never spoken to her of love? who had never, in 
word at least, expressed more than a friendly interest in 
her or hers? Was it her place to arraign the man as false 
or wicked who had given her no power to question his slightest 
action? And — oh shame on her womanhood — had she 
not confessed to loving him unsought, shamelessly confessed 
it, and,- above all, to that austere mother who held the faintest 
approach to enthusiasm as a species of madness ? 

The blood burned upon that young cheek as she remem- 


350 


The Wounded Bird. 


bered the words that scarcely seemed her own — words that 
had driven that proud mother from her roof, and now burned 
in fiery shame upon her cheek. But this sudden intelligence 
had driven her almost mad. Doubt, jealousy, and a thousand 
wild pangs rent her heart with a pain never dreamed of 
before. 

“ Oh, if the dead could arise, if the truth could be dragged 
up from the depths of their graves ! I cannot believe it, I 
will not believe it. My own cousin — my own dear sister, 
oh, if it should be true — if he has indeed wronged them in 
this fearful way.” 

She had sunk to the floor, and burying her face in her 
folded arms, murmuring these things aloud. The poor 
woman was so unused to passionate conflicts, that this gust 
of sorrow swept over her like madness. 

“ Mother,” said Edward, laying one plump hand on her 
shoulder, and bending his grieved face lovingly to hers, 
“ mother dear, look up ! The lady, the lady ! ” 

Mrs. Oakley lifted her face, affrighted that her passion 
should have had other witnesses than the child. But when 
she recognized the intruder, the feeling of annoyance gave 
way, and she arose with a sad smile, apologizing for her sin- 
gular position. 

“ I have brought a lame bird for little Edward to nurse,” 
said Catharine, entering the drawing-room, with her right 
hand folded over a robin nestled in the palm of her left. 
“ Some cat has wounded it, I fancy. See, darling, what I 
have brought for you.” 

Catharine spoke hurriedly, and turned her eyes away from 
Mrs. Oakley, for a single glance at her agitated face was 
enough to arouse all the instinctive delicacy of her nature. 

“ I don’t want a lame robin,” said Edward, turning away 
with tears in his eyes. “ They have hurt my pretty mamma, 
and I ’d rather take care of her. She ’s worse wounded than 
the bird.” 


The Wounded Bird . 


351 


Mrs. Oakley’s face flushed with fond triumph as the boy 
came toward her; turning her eyes upon Catharine, she said, 

“ Is n’t he truthful ? Is there a drop of faithless blood in 
his veins ? ” 

“ He is an angel ! ” answered Catharine, gazing fondly on 
the child, and stooping down, she passed her hand through 
the curls that fell over his white forehead. In doing this 
she exposed the tiny red cross which we have before seen 
among those clustering curls. 

Catharine caught her breath at the sight, and drew away 
her fingers as if the cross had been of living fire. 

“ What is this? — whose child is this? ” she questioned. 

“If I did but know — if I could but have a certainty! ” 
answered the widow, almost wildly. “ But why do you 
ask just now? Has every one conspired to torture me with 
doubts and accusations? Who told you that he was not my 
child?” 

“ No one,” answered Catharine. “ Up to this hour I sup- 
posed that he was your child ; but this mark, — forgive me, 
but I have seen it before.” 

“ When ? how ? Where did you ever see this red cross 
upon his temple?” 

“ I saw it, or one exactly like it, some years ago, upon an 
infant not three months old,” said Catharine, answering the 
impassioned interrogation with thoughtful sadness. 

“ And where? — not that the children could possibly have 
been the same, you know, — but where was the child with a 
cross like this ? ” 

Catharine hesitated a moment, and then answered with 
grave composure, — 

“ The child was a nursling in the house of a poor Irish 
woman, who was kind to me when I wanted friends.” 

“ But where did this Irish woman find him ? Of course, 
he had parents ? ” questioned the widow, breathlessly. 

“ I think he was an orphan.” 


352 


The Wounded Bird. 


“ Well, but where did she find him V’ 

Catharine grew very pale, but she answered quietly, — 

“ In Bellevue Hospital, I believe.” 

The widow drew a deep breath. She looked anxiously 
from little Edward to her visitor, attempted to speak, and 
desisted again, as if afraid of saying too much. 

“And his mother? Oh, for mercy’s sake, if you know 
anything of his mother, tell me about her ? ” 

“ I know nothing,” answered Catharine, with sudden re- 
serve. “ How should I ? ” 

“ Not even the mother’s name ? Only tell me that, and I 
will pray for you — bless you forever ! ” 

There was so much anxiety, something so eager in her 
voice and manner, that Catharine was deeply touched. 

“ I only know her Christian name, certainly,” she answered. 

“Yes, yes, and that was ” Mrs. Oakley broke off, 

checking herself suddenly in her interrogations. 

“ That was Louisa, I am sure it was Louisa ; as for the 
rest, I have no certainty.” 

“But you heard other names?” 

“Yes, several.” 

“Tell me, pray do — what other names did you hear?” 

“ One name was Barton ; the other ” Catharine 

stopped abruptly, and her face grew pallid. 

“Well, that other. I do not recognize this.” 

“ The other,” said Catharine, looking sadly into the anx- 
ious face turned upon her, “the other was your own name — 
Oakley.” 


Doubts and Fears. 


353 


CHAPTER LXYIII. 


DOUBTS AND FEARS. 


HERE was a new servant in Mrs. Townsend Oakley’s 



X household ; a large-featured, energetic person, whom 
the housekeeper had engaged in town as a chamber-maid. 
This woman was busy in the west room, when Catharine 
entered Mrs. Oakley’s parlor, and though occupied, she kept 
a vigilant watch on all that was passing between the two 
young women. She saw Catharine draw the boy toward 
her, and remarked the look of agitation which could not be 
misunderstood, on discovering the cross upon his temple. 
The distance prevented her hearing any words, but as she 
fixed her scrutiny upon the various faces of that little group, 
a gleam of sharp intelligence shot from her eyes, she softly 
laid down her duster, and keeping out of sight in the move- 
ment, crept stealthily behind the half-open door. 

Now she could hear their voices, low and troubled, but 
still distinct to her keen ear. 

“She is right, my mother is right,” said Mrs. Oakley, 
wringing her delicate hands in an abandon of grief. “ How 
dare he? How could he enter my house? How could I — 
oh ! weak, weak wretch that I am ! ” 

“Of w T hom do you speak?” said Catharine, pale as death, 
and shivering till her teeth chattered. 

“ Of He Marke, — of that boy’s father !” 

“And what of him?” The voice in which this question 
was asked had grown so husky, that the listener could 
scarcely hear it. 

“Listen to me,” was the answer. “I have no human 
being, except yourself, from whom it is possible for me to 
seek advice: and my position is a terrible one. You are 
not like a stranger to me, I can trust you.” 


22 


354 


Doubts and Fears. 


“Yes, you may trust me,” said Catharine, in a low, firm 
voice, “ I will deal honestly by you.” 

“ Look at this boy. Is he not beautiful ? His eyes, his 
mouth, his every movement, can anything be more frank ? ” 

“ He is lovely. No angel could be more innocent.” 

“ And yet that boy’s father, his own father, remember ! 
with a brow as open, an eye as frank, a lip always smiling, 
that boy’s father is — oh ! my God that I should live to say 
it — is a traitor — a — a — ” 

The poor lady broke off, closing the last words in bitter 
sobs. Her clasped hands unlocked, and she buried her 
face in them, trembling from head to foot, and weeping 
bitterly. 

“ You may wrong him,” said Catharine, faintly. 

“No, it is all too clear,” answered Mrs. Oakley, shaking 
her head mournfully ; “ his mother was poor Oakley’s sister. 
You saw her, she called herself by his name ; it was Oakley, 
not De Marke, that she called herself; are you sure of that? 
Oh ! it would be something to believe that he married her.” 

Catharine stood by a sofa. She sunk slowly down among 
the cushions, breathless and aghast. 

“You are certain that she did not call herself by his 
name. Oh ! try and remember.” 

“No, no, I never heard her claim that name,” fell in 
cold, measured words from Catharine Lacy, as she sat there 
stunned and immovable, as if suddenly frozen into stillness. : 

“ Still he might have been married to her. It is possible,” 
said the widow, with all a woman’s generous faith in the 
man she loves, rising up afresh in her heart. 

“ No ! ” answered Catharine, with the same cold measure- 
ment of words. “ It is impossible. He could not have 
been her husband.” 

“ Why, how do you know ? How came you with a knowl- 
edge of him or his ? ” cried the widow, with a pang of jeal- 
ous suspicion in her voice. 


Doubts and Fears . 


355 


“ Remember, lady, I have spent many, many months in 
public institutions ! ” answered Catharine. 

“ I know — I did not think. t Forgive me, I am almost 
mad. Besides, you do not seem like that, so kind, so sweet 
and lady-like.” 

“You have made me your friend, — I feel for you. This is 
a fearful discovery. But tell me, how can I help you ? ” 

“ Tell me all you know of this poor child’s mother. It 
may wound me to death, but I shall feel so restless till the 
worst is confirmed ; then perhaps God will give me strength. 
Tell me all ! ” 

“ I have, lady. She came to the hospital only a week or 
two before her death.” 

“ And you saw her then ? ” 

“ Yes ; I can never, never forget her poor, mournful face, 
never, never.” Catharine bowed her head, and a shiver ran 
through her frame, while two or three tears forced themselves 
through the hands, which she pressed over her eyes. 

“ Tell me more of her.” 

“ There is nothing to tell. She seldom spoke, seldom 
lifted her great, mournful eyes from the floor. I heard her 
once call the names I have mentioned ; but I think she was 
very ill then, and did not know what she was saying.” 

“ Was it when she was dying ? ” 

“ I don’t know. I remember seeing her dead, and carried 
out in her coffin ; but that is all. Indeed, indeed, I can tell 
you no more.” 

Catharine’s voice grew sharp with the struggle of her 
anguish. These questions tortured her. 

Mrs. Oakley was terrified by the pale contractions of that 
face. Never had she witnessed anguish so terrific and so still. 

“And De Marke could leave her to die without a word — 
could do this, and with the guilt on his soul come here with 
protest — no, no, not with protestations — crafty and careful, 
he looked love, but never talked of it. I cannot point out 


356 


Doubts and Fears . 


a single word of affection, and yet there was love in every 
look, every tone of his voice. Oh ! I cannot think of it 
with patience.” 

“ And you know that this man loves you ? ” asked Catha- 
rine, a little hoarser than before.* 

“ Loves me ? I never had a doubt of it till now — nay, 
I do not yet doubt it. He may be reckless, wicked, utterly 
unprincipled, but I know he loves me; and oh! shame, 
shame, shame, I love him.” 

“ You love him, knowing all this,” said Catharine, stand- 
ing up. 

“ It is my shame, and will be my misery forever and ever,” 
answered the widow, covering her face with both hands, 
while the hot crimson swept over her neck and forehead, 
like a fiery brand. 

“ And would you marry him?” The voice, in which this 
was uttered, fell so cutting upon her ear, that the widow 
dropped her hands, looking suddenly up. 

“ Marry him ? no ! To act is within my own control — to 
feel is, alas ! what I cannot help.” 

That moment, the little boy came across the room, his 
bright eyes full of tears. Holding up both hands, he strove 
to throw them around Mrs. Oakley’s neck. She drew back 
with a repulsive motion of her hand. His arms dropped, 
the rosy lips quivered, and sitting down upon the floor, he 
began to sob as if his heart were breaking. 

Both the women stood looking at him in pale silence. 
Suddenly their eyes filled, a simultaneous sob broke from 
their bosoms, and they sunk to the floor together, wreathing 
their arms around him and covering his face and brow with 
kisses. 

“ He is n’t to blame, you know,” pleaded the widow. But 
Catharine had dropped her face upon her knees, and only 
answered with a keen shiver, as if she were in pain. Thus 
she remained some minutes, evidently struck with a pang of 
great suffering. 


Doubts and Fears . 357 

“ Are you ill ? ” inquired Mrs. Oakley, laying a hand on 
her shoulder. 

“Yes, I believe I am ill,” answered Catharine, standing 
up. “ I will go home now.” 

“Not now. It is cruel, I know; but one word more. 
That letter mentioned another person, Catharine Lacy — did 
you know anything of her ? ” 

“ Catharine Lacy, who should know anything of her ? Is 
she not dead ? ” 

“ Yes, I know there is a record of her death at the hospi- 
tal ; but I should be so grateful for some further knowledge 
of her. You will not wonder at this when I tell you that 
she was my own cousin.” 

“ Your cousin, lady ; and yet permitted to die there? ” 

“ It was not my fault, oh ! believe it. I never even heard 
of her destitution.” 

“ But your mother ?” 

“ Hush ! It is not for me to arraign my mother ! ” 

“True, true.” 

“ Tell me, I beseech you, something about this poor girl. 
It was another mournful death for which that man must one 
day answer.” 

“ I can tell you nothing of Catharine Lacy. Her history 
is written out, they tell me, in the hospital books.” 

“ I am sorry that you know so little regarding her,” said 
the widow, disappointed. “ We.loved each other as children ; 
but I was always away at school, or somewhere, after that ; 
and we never saw each other. Poor, poor Catharine, she 
was an angel-child.” 

“ You loved her, then ? ” 

“Loved her? She was dearer than a sister to me. I 
would give anything, suffer anything to know that she was 
alive, or had died happy.” The widow’s eyes were full of 
tears, and a thousand regretful feelings trembled in her voice. 
“ Oh ! if you know anything about her, do tell me. ’ 


358 


Doubts and Fears . 


Catharine took the hand, held out to her, with a pathetic 
gesture, and kissed it, saying, — 

“ God bless you ! ” 

The next moment she was gone. The widow and child 
saw her glide through the French window into the veranda, 
and disappear like a shadow, as she had entered the room. 

Left to her solitude, Mrs. Oakley gave way to all the 
tumult of her feelings again. The certainty of her lover’s 
treason had been cruelly confirmed, and the thoughts of his 
enormous turpitude pressed back upon her with double force. 
The presence of that pretty, tearful child was for a time irk- 
some; and in the storm of her grief she escaped from his 
touching attempts to comfort her, and fled to her own room. 

After Catharine was gone, the new servant came out from 
her concealment and went up to little Edward, who sat 
crying upon the floor. She stooped over him, lifted the 
hair from his temple, and examined the cruciform mark 
with keen scrutiny. Then she returned slowly to her work, 
muttering uneasily between the flourishes of her duster. 

“ Catharine, Catharine — the name is Catharine, that’s 
certain ; as for the surname being different, that amounts to 
nothing — don’t I know how easy it is to change names? 
Why, have n’t I half-a-dozen to pick and choose from my. 
self? There is something in the face and the bend of the 
head that I could tell among a thousand. Now I just as 
much believe she’s the woman, and that ’s the very child, as 
I sit here; as for him, why the thing’s certain, but the other 
is n’t so easily settled.” 

Muttering these words, she sat down, folded her hands 
over the duster, and continued her ruminations. “ Then 
there was the story of that queer old woman coming to the 
Island, and the crazy woman up yonder following her into 
the very water ; this has something to do with the matter, I 
dare say. De Marke? oh! ha? that is the man who comes 
courting the widow. Iler son ! Now I have it. She was 


Madame De Markers Death-Bed . 


359 


the old woman with the comical bonnet, that was driven 
into the sea, — of course, of course, was n’t she lame, had n’t 
she been hurt someway when I found her in bed half starved 
to death. But what has she to do with that crazy woman, 
with the fiery black eyes? — I ’ll ravel it out, you may believe 
me ; I’ll ravel it out ; child, old woman, and all, they ’re 
mixed up in the same heap. Never fear, I ’ll be at the 
bottom of it yet.” 


CHAPTER LXIX. 

MADAME DE MARKE’s DEATH-BED. 

ADAME DE MARKE lay alone in her den, more 



m emaciated and weaker by far than she was when 
Jane Kelly abandoned her. For a little time she had 
found strength to creep about and procure food for herself, 
but some new injury to her bruised limb had followed the 
exertion, and she was cast back into her miserable bed more 
desolate than before. Day by day the inflammation burned 
and burrowed into her wounded limb, and all night long the 
poor woman lay muttering and raving for something to 
moisten her hot lips, “Water, water, water.” This was her 
plaint night and morning. With gold and jewels concealed 
in the crevices and hiding-places all around her, she lay 
like the rich man in torment, calling for a drop of water, 
which even the beggar obtains without stint, but for which 
she was calling always in vain. 

At last the fever ceased, the anguish w r ent out from her 
limb, and the miserable old woman lay quiet for the first 
time in days. The fever had kept up her strength till now, 
and she had not felt the need of food ; nor did she even yet. 
A dumb feeling of content stole over her ; she wanted nothing. 


360 Madame Be Markers Death-Bed . 

The silence of her chickens troubled her a little, but she had 
no strength to rise up and see to them. She thought of the 
cat, and wondered where she was, and why she did not come 
up to the bed and share the supreme content of that sudden 
freedom from pain. She thought of her son, with a gush 
of human tenderness, and resolved that, the next day, when 
she should be quite well, to gather up all her gold and go 
with it into some more seemly place, where she would summon 
him to her presence. 

But all these thoughts and resolves were vague and dreamy. 
She felt like one dropping into a sweet sleep, the very twi- 
light of which was delicious. She lay thus, in the dim, 
mean room, for it was lighted only by a sash in the door ; 
and the sunset that came through the red curtains had the 
effect of a dull, lurid flame, which could not penetrate to 
the bed, and filled the rest of the apartment with a fearful 
light. 

All at once she heard footsteps without, and turning her 
eyes, with a gleam of their original ferocity, toward the 
door, it opened, and she saw her son enter the room. She 
laughed a low, feeble laugh, and strove to hold out her 
hand ; but it fell numbly and heavily on the squalid bed, 
while the laugh died in a faint chuckle within her working 
throat. 

“Madame, Madame!” cried the young man, gazing around 
the room, at first bewildered by the imperfect light, and 
filled with repulsion by the squalid objects around him. 
“ Madame — mother ! ” 

A murmur rose from the bed, which struck to his heart, 
sweeping all the disgust away. The affection of a warm na- 
ture, ardent and forgiving, gushed forth even in that spot. 

“ Mother. Oh ! my poor mother.” 

She looked up, and strove to speak ; but a pitiful whimper 
alone passed through the white lips. 

“Mother! mother! What have I done? How could I 
leave you to this ? ” 


Madame De Marled s Death-Bed. 361 

Her eyes kindled ; she made a great effort ; and at last, as 
if forced through the ice gathering about her heart, the 
words, “ My son, my son ! ” shot through her lips. 

“ Oh ! mother, is this all ? Can you only speak with this 
fearful effort ? Where is your nurse ? Who takes care of 
you ? ” 

Again she made that fearful struggle, and jerking her 
arm on one side, pointed downward to the floor. 

“ My gold. I have gold — gold ! ” 

The young man groaned heavily. 

“ Do not think of that — your gold is nothing at this hour ! ” 

Again she lifted her finger, and pointed it to his face. 

“ Gold — it is everything/’ 

“ Hush, mother, hush. At this awful moment think of 
something else. I fear, I fear you are dying.” 

“ Dying ! ” This time the word was forced upward with 
a shriek so wild and fearful, that the young man sunk to 
his knees, and buried his face in the soiled bed drapery, 
shuddering in every limb. 

“ Oh ! mother, mother ! ” 

“Dying! me — me dying! ’’broke from those convulsed 
lips once more. 

Louis De Marke looked up. With his quivering hand 
he grasped that of the dying woman. 

“Yes, mother, believe me, there is but a little time for us 
to settle all that has gone ill between us. I came to ask you 
some questions, thinking to meet you in good health. The 
shock of finding you thus is terrible. I pray God, it is not 
too late for either of us.” 

“Dying! Take it back, take it back! I am well; no 
pain, no hunger, no thirst. Dying ! ” and with a miserable 
effort the woman strove to laugh, but the attempt went off 
in a gurgle of the throat. 

The young man made a great struggle for self-command ; 
but he was very pale, and his lips quivered with the emo- 
tions he strove so firmly to suppress. 


362 Madame JDe Marlce’s Death-Bed. 

“ Yes, mother, I solemnly believe that this interview will 
be our last. Your haud is cold, your eyes are — oh! don’t 
look at me in that way,” he continued, shuddering at the 
glance she fixed upon him. “ Next to the welfare of your 
soul — ” 

She interrupted him, groping about with her hand. 

“ My crucifix — my crucifix ! ” 

He searched under her pillow and around the dim room, 
while she followed him with her wild, despairing eyes. At 
last, as if with some sudden resolution, she shrieked out, — 

“ It is gone — she stole it, she has pawned my soul.” 

The young man came back to the bed in great distress. 
He knelt by her side, and strove to soothe the despair that 
had evidently fallen upon her. 

“Oh, mother, strive to compose yourself; lift up your 
heart to God. It needs no crucifix. He is close by, even 
here.” 

The old woman started, and her wild eyes wandered fear- 
fully around the room. 

“ Pray to him, mother.” 

“No, it is lost, I have sold his Son — no, no.” 

“ Mother, is there nothing that you wish to say ? My 
brother George — have you no word for him?” 

“ Hush, hush ! he will take your portion. He married. 
He wished to rob you. Don’t speak to me of Elsie Ford’s 
son, or of his son either. Let them alone, and you shall be 
rolling in gold, rolling, rolling, like your mother! ” 

The young man bent down and listened eagerly to her 
words. 

“ Did my brother marry Catharine Lacy, then, with your 
knowledge ? ” 

“No, they tried to cheat me — to bring a son to claim 
your father’s property. She ought to have died, that Cath- 
arine Lacy.” 

“ But she did not. Where is she now ? Is she alive ? 


Madame De Marled s Death-Bed. 363 

Oh ! tell me, mother. I shall never be happy again unless 
you do ! ” 

“Yes, she ’s alive. I saw her myself, changed but alive. 
The other girl died. I did n’t want that, for she would have 
been rich, and you might have done well with her.” 

“ Then you knew about my wife ? ” 

“ Knew ? yes ! Did you think I was cheated ? ” 

“ But why did you leav£ her to die there ?” 

“ How could I help it ? She would hide herself till the 
last minute, and it was cheaper there. Sickness costs money, 
money, I tell you.” 

“ And you are certain Louisa died in the hospital ? But 
there is no register of her death ! ” 

“We had that changed, the numbers and the names. 
Louisa would die, Catharine woidd live. W e could n’t help it.” 
“But where is Catharine?” 

A look of sharp cunning came into those sunken features. 
“ I won’t tell. The time is n’t up. He is n’t crazy yet. 
I won’t help him to bring sons to eat up one-half of your 
inheritance.’’ 

“ Mother, remember that you are dying.” 

“ Not yet, not for years. I ’m getting stronger every minute. 
Don’t you see how I can talk now. When you came, there 
was n’t a word in my voice. I shall live to see you and 
Oakley’s widow rolling in gold. She ’s rich.” 

“ Oakley’s widow — what do you know of her ? ” 

“ What do I know ? Had n’t I eyes ? Did n’t I watch 
you when she was married, watch and listen and pick up 
things? Did n’t I know what was going on in the mind of 
my own son ? ” 

“O mother, how much misery you might have saved 
me ! ” cried the young man in a passion of grief. 

“ Have n’t I just told you she was dead, your young wife ? 
Did n’t I go down to that cottage, on the Island, to see this 
widow and learn all about her ? Is n’t this kind, when you 


364 


Madame JDe Markers Death-Bed . 


have been pining and pining about her ? I did n’t want to 
explain that she was dead, and Catharine Lacy alive — it 
may do mischief yet. It may bring them together, and des- 
poil you of one half the property. He won’t go crazy. When 
he thought the girl dead, it only made him melancholy ; he 
would not go mad. Let him find her, and all that I have 
done will go for nothing.” 

“ Mother, you should be more just to George. He is 
your husband’s oldest son.” 

“ He is her son, and I hate them both.” 

“ But his mother is dead, years ago.” 

Again that cunning gleam broke into her eyes ; but the 
woman did not speak. 

“ Have you no kind remembrance for my brother? ” said 
the young man, on whom that ^Jeam of the eye made no 
impression, “ he has never wronged you.” 

“ Oh ! yes, take that,” she said, pointing to a picture that 
stood near the door, with its face to the wall. “ It has been 
his friend from first to last — tell him it nearly cost me my 
life. The crazy wretch worshipped the picture, — I knew 
that, and would have it. She came at me like a panther ; 
we were on the shore ; I ran for the boat and she after me 
into the water, knee-deep. The man pulled with all his 
might; but she held me by the throat, tore at me like a 
wolf. My foot got fast in the cross-beam of the boat, or 
she would have drowned me before their faces. The boat- 
men had to beat her off with their oars, and she let go ; but 
left my ankle and foot w r renched and bruised till I have 
never had a minute’s rest till now — * not a minute. Give 
him the picture, with my love. It’s cost me dear ; but she 
has n’t got it to pine and pray over. Give him the picture, 
I say ; it’s all he will ever get from me.” 

Louis De Marke listened to this wild speech, shocked and 
bewildered. To him it had no meaning, but it grieved him 
to find so much of bitterness and malice in what he thought 


365 


Little Eddie’s Grief. 

to be the last ravings of an unrepentant soul, and that soul 
the one from which his own drew life. 

“ Oh ! mother, calm yourself, try and talk more rationally ; 
you are ill, very ill ; once more I say to you this is the last 
conversation we shall ever hold together.” 

“ Son, do you believe this ? On your soul, is it the truth? ” 

She spoke in a hoarse murmur. The artificial strength 
was leaving her in the very grasp of death. 

“ Mother, yes ! ” 

The woman uttered a low, long wail, inexpressibly mourn- 
ful. 

“ It is on me now; it is on me now ; my feet are numb ; 
the ice is creeping up to my heart ! Holy Jesus, this is death ! ” 

The horror that settled down, with the deathly gray, on 
her pinched features, was t%rrible to look upon ; but more 
terrible still was the film that crept over the wild glare of 
her eyes, pressing them slowly in the sockets. He sat and 
watched, silent and appalled. So long as those eyes had the 
power to express the terror that froze them, they were turned 
upon his face. There was no agonizing struggle. Slowly 
and terribly, that old woman froze out of existence ; and 
death left her in that squalid bed, a meagre shadow of the 
humanity her whole life had degraded. 


CHAPTER LXX. 
little eddie’s grief. 

M ADAM, a gentleman wishes to see you in the parlor.” 

Mrs. Oakley started up from the depths of a great 
easy-chair, in which she had been striving to bury her grief ; 
and with breathless nervousness, very unusual to her, paced 
the room two or three times, smoothing the bandeaux of her 


366 


Little Eddie's Grief. 

hair rapidly with each hand as she walked. When this 
quick motion had composed her a little, she went down. 

The parlor was dim from the flowering vines that clus- 
tered around its windows. But though she saw her visitor 
but indistinctly, her heart gave a great bound, and she felt 
the blood surge back and forth from her bosom to her tem- 
ples, leaving both paler than before. 

“ Lady, dear lady ! ” 

It was his voice. It was De Marke that came toward 
her, with both hands extended, looking so bright, so strangely 
happy. 

Mrs. Oakley put out her hands to repulse him. “No, no, 
do not advance ; do not come near me. I have been already 
sufficiently degraded ! ” 

De Marke stood still, dumb with astonishment, while she 
shrunk backward, step by step, with her frightened eyes 
upon him, as if she dreaded lest the fascination in his glance 
would enthrall her again. 

“ Mrs. Oakley,” he said at last, “ may I ask the meaning 
of this reception?” 

His voice was a little tremulous, but full of self-respect. 

“ You have come here to insult me, sir ! ” 

“ I have come here, lady, to say how truly and how long 
I have loved you.” 

The widow locked her white hands together and held 
them firmly ; resentment was giving her strength. 

“ Had you never said the same words to Louisa Oakley, 
my husband’s sister, she need not have died of shame in a 
charity hospital ! ” she answered, almost harshly. 

De Marke staggered back. The name or his lost wife 
from those lips, and spoken in bitterness, brought a terrible 
pang with it. At last he spoke; but it was' in a low, broken 
voice, that went to her heart. 

“ There was poverty and great suffering in Louisa’s death; 
but no shame, Mrs. Oakley. She was my wife. I was 


Little Eddie’s Grief. 867 

absent, a minor and helpless ; but had I known that she 
was in danger or suffering from any cause, I would have 
saved her at the risk of my life.” 

“Then it was not neglect — it was not from wanton cruelty 
that you left her?” questioned the widow, drawing gently 
toward him. 

“ Sit down with me, lady ; it is a sad story. I have been 
tO' blame, but not criminal. Will you listen to me?” 

They sat down together in the dim parlor, and he told 
her everything, even the first love which bad grown strong 
in his boyhood; and all its painful results were fully re- 
vealed. At first she listened to him with a degree of proud 
reserve ; but as he went on to lay his heart before her, the 
love-light came back to her eyes, and tears of gentle grief 
stole up through that light and trembled softly there. Her 
hand crept to his, timidly asking pardon for the harsh 
thoughts that had melted away with the honest tones of his 
voice. 

“ And now,” he said, closing his hand firmly over hers, 
“ can you forgive the rashness of my youth ? Can you trust, 
can you love me ? ” 

She did not answer; but the tears that stood upon her 
cheek seemed like dew-drops upon a damask rose. She bent 
her head toward him, half in shame, half in love, like a 
flower heavy with rain. He gathered her softly to his bosom, 
his hand was pressed caressingly on one flushed cheek, the 
other lay close to his heart. 

“ Oh, I was sure of it. Love like mine — so deep, so faith- 
ful — could not be wholly without a return. Tell me, dear 
one, is this not true ? ” 

“ I love you. Indeed, indeed, I love you ? ” 

It is impossible to say how many times, and in how many 
forms, this one sentence was repeated, before the two parted : 
but one thing is certain, he had not been gone half an hour 
before both of them were restless to repeat every word of it 
again. 


368 


Little Eddie’s Grief. 

After he was gone, the happy lady wandered forth into the 
grounds, for the rooms of her dwelling seemed altogether too 
small for the breadth and glory of her happiness. She 
longed for the open air, the free winds, anything that spoke to 
her of the heaven which lived in her own heart. As she 
passed through the flower-garden, a sob reached her from 
behind a honeysuckle arbor near the path. Any sound of 
grief was discord to her then, so she turned aside, resolved to 
make everything happy on that blissful day. 

She entered the arbor, and there, crouching down upon 
the tessellated floor, was poor little Edward, complaining to 
himself and sobbing as if that dear little heart were quite 
broken. How her conscience smote her then ! How quick 
and fast the tears came rushing to her eyes. 

“ Eddie, Eddie, darling ! ” 

The child lifted his flushed face. A smile danced up from 
his heart and broke in sunshine all over it. 

“ Mamma, mamma ! ” he cried, leaping forward, his white 
arms extended, and the tears sparkling joyfully in his eyes, 
“ you are not angry, you love me, darling mamma ? ” 

“Love you?” cried the widow, raining kisses upon his 
face. “ Love you, daring. I love everything under the 
heavens, this day, and you, little one, best of all.” 
y Don’t believe that, little Eddie. The warm blushes on 
her face, as she buries it in your curls, contradict every word 
of it. She loves you a great deal more than she did before, 
certainly ; but her heart has grown large and rich since yes- 
terday; and with all these caresses you are not the first 
there. Content yourself about that, little Eddie. 

In her walk that day, Mrs. Oakley met Catharine, who was 
rambling sadly through -the grounds, which we have said 
adjoined each other, with Elsie Ford. The two women 
were very melancholy, and a look of continued pain lay 
upon them both. No wonder their lives were so sombre, so 
completely cast upon the shadowy side of existence. Elsie 


369 


Little Eddie's Grief. 

was very quiet, and her large black eyes wandered toward 
the little boy with sorrowful intensity ; but she seemed afraid 
to touch him, muttering that he too would fly away and 
become nothing if she did. 

The boy looked at her wistfully, and once attempted to 
approach her, for those troubled eyes fascinated him. She 
waved him back, and gathering an over-ripe thistle, that 
grew in her path, the ghost of a flower that had been, she 
cast a sigh into its shadowy heart, and, lo ! the whole disap- 
peared. A few silvery gleams floated off toward sunset, 
and she held nothing but a dead, thorny stalk in her hand. 

“ See, see ; don't come this way ; everything I touch melts 
like that, into nothing, nothing, nothing.” 

The boy looked on and listened. Her voice was so sadly 
musical, it charmed him. He was very fearless, too, and 
moved toward her. 

She stepped backward, repelling him with her outstretched 
palms. 

“ Don’t, don’t, you are so pretty. I won’t hurt you . Go 
away, or it will come to this.” 

She held up the dry, thorny stem of the thistle, and shook 
it warningly at the child. Repelled by this, he went away, 
following Mrs. Oakley and Catharine, who had walked for- 
ward, keeping the demented woman in sight. 

“ Will you not rejoice that this terrible load is taken from 
my heart,” said the widow, chilled by the gravity of her com- 
panion. “ The only trouble with me now is, that I could 
have doubted him.” 

“ And is he equally happy ? ” inquired Catharine, in a low 
voice. “ You are sure that he, too, is happy ? ” 

“ I wish you could have seen him. It would be impossi- 
ble to think otherwise. You know there was some doubt at 
first that his wife was dead ; but it ’s all cleared up now. 
His mother, with her dying breath, set it all right.” 

22 


870 Little Eddie’s Grief “ 

“ And the knowledge that his wife was dead made him 
happy, you say ? ” 

“Perfectly happy. Eemember, it was a long time ago, 
and he — but poor, poor girl, if he did not love her, he 
w T ould always have been affectionate and kind.’’ 

“ Did De Marke tell you that he did not love the girl 
whom he married and left ? It was an unfeeling confession,” 
said Catharine, in a trembling voice. 

“It was necessary in order to explain everything. He 
gave me his whole heart. This is what makes me so happy 
— nothing is kept back. Eemember, I was engaged to Mr. 
Oakley when he first saw me/’ 

“ And he married this other person, without love, merely 
from compassion, you say ! ” 

“ I do not know ; it seems hard to speak of the dead in a 
way that would wound them, if living ; but I am quite sure 
that De Marke has loved me from the first. He says so, 
and I believe him, in spite of this rash marriage.” 

“ I think so too ! ” answered Catharine, in a grave, cold 
voice. Still he might remember how that poor, lone girl 
worshipped him.” 

“It is very sad, I am sure it must be very sad, to love any 
one whose heart is not all given back in return. The an- 
guish which I have felt during these few days has been so 
terrible, that I can well pity those who suffer with like 
doubts.” 

“ Can you ? I think you are generous and good. Love 
like yours should be given to a worthy object.” 

“ It is ! it is C I would stake my life upon his goodness.”' 

“And if it were yet proved otherwise?” said Catharine, 
turning her large eyes search ingly on the happy face of her 
companion.” 

/~“ I think — I know,” answered the widow, with a shudder, 
“that it would kill me — I could not live after all this hap- 
piness, to be cast back even into doubt again.” 


Questions and Confessions . 371 

Catharine looked at her friend very mournfully for a 
moment. 

“ We suffer a great deal without dying,” she said; mov- 
ing slowly away, she joined Elsie and the child. 


CHAPTER LXXI. 

QUESTIONS AND CONFESSIONS. 

C ATHARINE was alone with old Mrs. Ford. Excite- 
ment, and a wild sense of some mysteries which she had 
failed to fathom, made her bold. She plunged abruptly into 
a subject long upon her mind, but which she had never 
ventured to hint at before. Indeed, the quick crowding of 
painful thoughts, during the last few weeks, had rendered 
her desperate. 

“ Mrs. Ford ! ” 

Catharine’s voice was so sharp and abrupt, that it made 
the old lady start and drop the sewing she was engaged on 
into her lap. 

“ What is it ? ” she said, breathlessly ; for her thoughts 
always turned to one object, “ Elsie, is anything wrong with 
Elsie?” 

“ Mrs. Ford, there is a thing I wish to ask, a thing which 
I must ask or die. Who is Elsie ? Is her name Ford, was 
she ever married, has she a child?” 

Catharine spoke rapidly, almost wildly. Her eyes were 
keenly anxious, her manner desperate. 

Mrs. Ford sat silently gazing upon the speaker. Her face, 
always pale, grew white and cold ; her little withered hands 
crept together and interlocked in her lap. 

“ What, what is it you ask ? Y ou,” — the words dropped, 


372 


Questions and Confessions. 

half-formed, from her lips ; and she gave a scared look at the 
door, as if preparing to escape. 

“ Don’t ! oh, don’t refuse to speak,” pleaded Catharine. 
“ I must know ; my heart will break if I am left in this ter- 
rible darkness. What connection has your daughter with 
the De Marke family ? ” 

“ De Marke — De Marke — who ever mentioned the name 
in this house?” said old Mr. Ford, who entered at the 
moment. 

Catharine turned to him. “ It is I. Tell me, I beseech 
you, what have the De Markes done, that the name should 
drive the blood from your faces ? Why did the portrait of 
a De Marke hang up in your library ? How, and why has 
it disappeared ? I ask these things, because it is impossible 
to live in such darkness. My own life, and all its hopes are 
at stake. What brought that wicked old woman here ? I 
must know, or become mad by the side of our poor Elsie! ” 

The old people exchanged glances. Both were pale, but 
a look of gentle commisseration settled upon their features. 

“ This is no idle question, Catharine,” said the old man, 
gently, but with a quiver of the voice, “ you would not wound 
us so from mere curiosity.” 

“ Not for my life. I must know all this hidden history, 
to see the path that I ought to tread. I am weak and 
blinded — alone, with no one but God to help me. Tell me 
the history of your daughter, tell me why the name of De 
Marke makes you tremble. Is it fatal to others as it has 
been to me?” 

“You,” said the old man in surprise, “you !” 

“ Even so, Mr. Ford. I was married to a De Marke, and 
he is still living.” 

The old lady arose, with an air of timid repulsion, and 
would have left the room ; but her husband gently waved 
her back. 

“ She suffers ; she, too, is a victim, perhaps another Elsie,” 


Questions and Confessions . 373 

he said, compassionately. ‘‘Now, my child, come hither; 
sit down by the mother and tell her all.” 

Catharine sat down, still supported by nervous excitement, 
and laid her heart and her life open before those pure-minded 
old people. It was astonishing how little time it took to re- 
late events and agonies that had been so long in the acting. 
She concealed nothing. From the very depths of her soul 
she drew forth the secrets that had been hoarded there, cor- 
roding and wounding all her faculties, and laid them hon- 
estly down before those kindly judges. 

The old people listened, sometimes sadly, sometimes with 
broken exclamations. Once or twice glances of surprise, 
almost of affright, passed between them. When she had 
finished, the old lady bent down, with tears in her eyes, and 
kissed her, while the husband stood over them, and lifting 
his hands to heaven, thanked God that she had been cast 
beneath his roof. 

Catharine arose from her knees, for she had unconsciously 
fallen at Mrs. Ford’s feet, with a deeper breath and more 
glowing countenance than she had worn for years. No ex- 
planation had yet been offered by the old people ; but she 
felt certain that some unseen link of union existed between 
her fate and theirs, and without speaking, she gazed wist- 
fully in their faces, waiting for light. 

“Yes,” said the old man, fervently, “it is true. God 
does sometimes send angels to us unawares. Catharine, my 
child, it is your husband’s mother to whom you have given 
up the bloom and strength of your young life. The father 
of George De Marke married Elsie Ford, our daughter.” 

“ And you — and you ? ” cried Catharine, eagerly. 

“Are his grandfather — ” 

“And Madame de Marke?” 

“Hush! do not mention her name; it is an accursed 
sound under this roof,” answered the old man, almost sternly. 

Catharine sat down, silenced, but still keenly anxious. 


374 


Questions and Confessions . 

The old gentleman seated himself also, close by his wife, 
who regarded him with a look, half frightened, half sor- 
rowful. 

“ Tell her,” said the old man, in a low voice, “ women 
understand each other best.” 

“ I cannot. See how I shake.” 

The'old man took the hand held toward him in both of 
his, smoothing and caressing it with gentle tenderness. 

“ You can witness,” he said, addressing Catharine, “ how 
great this sorrow has been. She cannot bear to speak of it. 
For years we have been silent, even with each other.” 

“ I see,” answered Catharine, looking wistfully at the old 
lady, and following her own thoughts. “ His grandmother ! 
That is why she seemed so lovely from the first — his grand- 
mother, and his mother, oh ! how I have been unconsciously 
blessed.” 

“Elsie,” said the old man, looking anxiously at his wife, 
as if afraid that her strength would give way, “ Elsie was 
our only child. You see her now, a poor, brain-crazed old 
woman; gray-headed and broken-hearted; but then she 
was — ” 

“ Oh ! ” broke in the old lady, with her eyes full of tears, 
that dimmed the glasses of her spectacles like a frost, “ she 
was the dearest, the brightest, the most beautiful creature 
that ever trod the green grass. You don’t know — you 
can’t tell, how many sweet, wild ways she had, and all 
straight to the heart. He did n’t merely love her, nor did I ; 
it was worship in us both ; we idolized this child ; there was 
not a curl of her black hair, or a glance of her eyes, bright 
and brimfull of feeling as they always were, which was not 
lovely beyond all things to us. 

“ Kemember, Catharine, she was our only child, a late bless- 
ing; for we had been years married when God sent this 
angel to our fireside. You have seen her portrait in the 
library. It is like her, and yet the bright sparkle of her 


Questions and Confessions . 375 

nature, the vivid flush of life, that came and went like sun- 
shine upon the hills, this no man could paint. It is all over 
now. You can see nothing of what I am telling you in her 
wild eyes, or in the sharp features that are at times so rigid 
and again so stolid ; but we find it still. Don’t w T e, hus- 
band ? Is n’t she beautiful to us, even yet ? ” 

“ She is more than beautiful, our poor Elsie,” said the old 
man, looking through the window to where the demented 
one wandered to and fro on the grass, striving to catch the 
humming-birds that haunted a trumpet vine, by quick 
dashes of her hand among the clustering bells. “ God has 
rendered her sacred — always and forever a child, spite of 
her gray hairs. They cast her back upon our hearth-stone, 
a poor, broken waif, but still a blessing. 

“ I think,” continued the old man, “ that it was a little 
before her seventeenth birthday, when Elsie first saw that 
man. He was a dashing young fellow, who had just come 
into possession of a large property, and had returned from 
his travels abroad, before entering upon the business of life. 
A neighbor, who lives across the Island, had invited him 
for a long visit, and through this friend he was introduced 
into our family. 

“ We did not think it strange, that young De Marke should 
admire our Elsie. Who could help it? But when she, 
who had always been bright as a bird and as heart-free, 
began to look thoughtful in his absence, and shy in his pres- 
ence, it pained us a good deal ; for she seemed still a mere 
child, and we had hoped to keep her in the home-nest a few 
years longer. 

“It'was a wild, violent passion on both sides. We had 
no power to resist, for he came with his impetuous pleading, 
and she, with a thousand winning ways, sometimes lost in 
tears, sometimes bathed in smiles, lured us from our better 
judgment. She was far too young, too ardent. Oh ! we 
should not have consented. 


376 


Elsie’s Mamed Life.. % 

“This De Marke was of French origin, as you will judge 
by his name, mercurial and impulsive, as most of the blood 
are. I do not think he was a bad or faithless man, at 
heart. I know that he loved Elsie, not as she loved him 
that was impossible — but he did love her 1” 

“ Yes,” murmured the old lady, “ he did love her. Who 
could help it?” 


CHAPTER LXXII. 
elsie’s married life. 

D E MARKE and Elsie were married,” continued the 
old man. “ Elsie was our only one, and all that we 
possessed was hers, even then, had she desired it. We only 
stipulated with her husband, that, during a portion of the 
year, they should make their home with us, here in the old 
family mansion, which Elsie would some day have entirely 
to herself. 

“De Marke would have consented to anything, in those 
days; but this proposition pleased him greatly. Alterations 
were made in the east wing. The library was added, and 
De Marke brought the choicest of his books from town, that 
his young wife should blend thoughts of himself even with 
her studies. It was settled that one half of the year should 
be spent with us, where Elsie should go on with her studies, 
and that they should occupy her husband’s town-house during 
the other six months. 

“It was a sad day for us when the darling gave her young 
life so completely to another. Yet, socially speaking, the 
match was a good one. Elsie was never entirely our own, 
after that ; the intense affection which she gave to her hus- 
band was too absorbing for the milder and calmer love that 
had grown in her heart for us. 


377 


Elsie’s Married Life . 

“ For a year they were very happy. In my whole life, I 
have never witnessed bliss so absorbing and complete. The 
joy of a common life-time was concentrated into those twelve 
brief months. The mother and I forgot our partial isolation, 
in witnessing a happiness so complete for our child. You 
ha^e seen the library, and perhaps wondered at the disuse 
into which it had fallen when you first came to us. That 
room De Marke fitted up for his bride. In it they studied 
together, for Elsie was no common girl, and all that her 
husband knew she was resolved to learn. 

“ It was in the latter part of this first year that the two 
portraits were taken. That of Elsie, in the flush of her joy 
and beauty, may give you some idea of whqt she was then. 
I believe that of De Marke was equally faithful. You have 
seen them. You have sat in the room which was for a time 
their Eden. De Marke was a young man, ardent, rash, and 
inflated, by a premature acquaintance with the world, w r ith a 
false idea of woman. He had no real faith in the sex. Of 
French descent, he had naturally spent much of his time in 
Paris, that hot-bed, in which so much that is pure and great 
in our young men is almost certain to perish. 

“ It was more than a year before Elsie left our house. 
Her child was born here, and directly after that De Marke 
was absent two or three months on a pleasure excursion. 

“ Elsie, who had been studying the languages with him, 
being still imperfect in the French, consented to receive a 
person of that nation into our house, during her husband’s 
absence, as a companion and teacher. I am not sure that 
De Marke ever' knew this person before; but it was through 
his means that she came to the house. 

“She was quiet enough, this strange Frenchwoman, and 
devoted herself to Elsie and the child with great assiduity. 
We saw little of her, for she took her meals in Elsie’s apart- 
ments, but it was impossible to doubt that she soon gained a 
remarkable ascendency over her young mind. But as our 


378 


Elsie's Married Life . 

child was won from the loneliness, which fell upon her after 
De Marke’s absence, by this companionship, we were grate- 
ful to the woman. 

“ At last, De Marke returned. He was evidently very 
glad to see his wife and child, but the reaction of an ill- 
regulated nature was upon him, and Elsie took this to heart 
as an estrangement. Her health had not returned entirely, 
after the birth of her boy, and she w 7 as the more susceptible 
on this account. For the first time in her life, our child 
became irritable and sometimes unjust. De Marke resented 
this; and at last came struggles, reproaches, and those sullen 
hours that eat into the happiness like a rust. 

“ Elsie was only struggling for her husband’s love, and he 
could not comprehend that the deepest love can be tortured 
into bitter words. 

“ In this crisis, common to ardent natures like theirs, that 
Frenchwoman became the confidante of both husband and 
wife. 

“ In this state, De Marke took his wife from her old home, 
and installed her "in a splendid establishment, which he had 
prepared for her reception in tire city. She left us — that 
poor child — drowned in tears — and in tears she came to 
us again. 

“We never knew what passed in Elsie’s home after thi3. 
Once or twice we visited her always to return, with heavy 
hearts. Amid all the splendor with which De Marke sur- 
rounded her, she seemed pining to death. But Elsie had 
grown proud and reserved even with her old parents, and 
when we asked the cause of her evident anxiety, she would 
strive to cheer us with smiles, and that w r as heart-breaking. 

“ The Frenchwoman had changed more than Elsie. 
From a quiet, humble dependant, she had sprung up into an 
assuming, fine lady, and seemed far more decidedly mistress 
of the house than our daughter. Elsie did not seem aware 
of this, for her poor, wistful eyes were alw T ays fixed on one 


379 


Elsie’s Married Life . 

point. She cared for no authority save that which sprung 
from her husband’s love. I doubt if she was conscious how 
great the alteration was which we detected in the deportment 
of this Frenchwoman. 

“ At last, a change stole over Elsie ; a fever of the heart 
came on ; she dashed aside her tears, and plunged madly 
into the fashionable world. She was young, fresh, and won- 
derfully beautiful. Her husband’s wealth gave power to 
these attractions. She became the reigning belle of water- 
ing-places, the queen of every assembly-room. We read her 
praises in the fashionable journals. Through all society her 
loveliness shone light like a star. 

“ And we two lonely old people heard all this with aching 
hearts ; for w 7 ell we knew this eclat was but another expres- 
sion of our daughter’s misery. Then followed other para- 
graphs in the journals that had been so busy with the praise 
of our child. Dark hints, mysterious insinuations, and at 
last open scandal, that made the mother’s cheek turn white, 
and the blood boil in my veins. We were quiet people ; but 
it was impossible to endure this. To-morrow, I said, to-mor- 
row I will go after my child 5 ; they have driven her to des- 
peration; she shall come home; and that man shall render 
us a strict account of his conduct regarding her. 

“ The mother only answered me with her tears and gentle 
entreaties that I would bring Elsie home. 

“ Everything was ready. In the morning, I was to set 
forth ; but that night, that very night, our child, our poor, 
poor Elsie came home, in the dark, and all alone. 

“ Her husband had turned her out-of-doors. 

“ We were sitting together, the mother and I, waiting for 
the morning ; for sleep was impossible, and we felt less un- 
happy in each other’s presence, though we scarcely exchanged 
a word in the profound sadness that had fallen upon us. 
Never, in my whole life, do I remember a night of such 
dreary length. Everything was still. It was winter, and 


380 


Elsie’s Married Life . 

the snow was falling out-of-doors in great flakes, with that 
perpetual whiteness which makes a night-storm so ghastly. 
The hickory logs had burned through, and fallen apart into 
a bed of dying embers ; and lay smouldering away, giving 
out smoke, but no flame. 

“ The old ebony clock ticked loud and sharp, filling the 
silence with its irritating count of time. Once in a while, 
we looked out through the frosted windows, searching for a 
flush of daylight upon the snow; but always to see that 
eternal sheet of whiteness becoming broader and deeper all 
around us. This dismal spectacle drove us back into the 
room, and still another hour we sat cowering together, over 
the hearthstone that had never seemed cold till then. 

“ We had drawn closer and closer together, till the fire 
went wholly out, sharing the misery of that hour in deathly 
silence. The mother’s hand was growing cold in mine, but 
I had no strength to urge her to bed or wish to rekindle the 
fire. Gloomy as everything was, the misery in our hearts 
was darker still. 

“ All at once, I felt the mother’s hand quiver in mine. 
Her eyes were turned to the window, and directly my gaze 
followed hers. 

“A human face was pressed to the window, a face, pale 
as the snow that lay in wreathing flakes adown those tresses 
of black hair, and two black eyes looked in upon us. 

“ We arose, holding the breath from our lips, and walked 
hand-in-hand toward the door, treading softly, as if we felt 
ourselves in the presence of a ghost. 

“ I opened the door and strove to call our poor child by 
name ; but the tongue clove to my mouth, and all the sound 
I could make went off through the falling snow like a sob 
of wind. 

“ The mother’s heart broke its ice first, and in a tender 
wail she called out, ‘ Elsie, Elsie ! my child, my child ! ’ 


Elsie Returns Home . 


381 


CHAPTER LXXIII. 


ELSIE RETURNS HOME. 


UR child came toward us, pale and cold, as if drifted to 



\j her mother’s bosom by the storm. Her trembling arms 
were held out pleadingly, her eyes seemed full of frozen 
tears. She shivered from head to foot, and her teeth chat- 
tered, partly with cold, partly with anguish. She fell for- 
ward upon her mother’s bosom, moaning ; but no words 
came with the desolate sound. 

“The mother grew strong now — that frail, little woman 
yonder — and would not let me help her, as she staggered 
back to the room, carrying her child forward also. 

“ ‘ Give me fire,’ she said, looking at the black hearth. 
‘ Is this the welcome we offer our child ? ’ 

“ I knelt down upon my hands and knees, thanking God 
for the return of that poor girl ; while I raked the embers 
together, and blew them into life with my lips. I heaped 
dry wood upon the coals, and when the flame leaped through, 
lighting the features of my child, I turned to look upon her, 
where she lay upon the mother’s bosom. 

“ Her eyes were wide open, and a dusky rim that swept 
under gave intensity to the blackness. When she saw me 
looking at her, those poor lips, all blue and cold, began to 
quiver, and a gush of tears changed the stony grief in her 
whole face to a look of such mournful tenderness, that I too 
burst into tears. 

“‘Father!’ she cried, reaching forth her two hands as she 
had done when a little child, — ‘father ! ’ 

“ I stretched out my arms, and strove to draw her down- 
ward to the bosom that yearned to hold her ; but the mother 
put me back, with a wave of the hand, and folding Elsie 
close to her heart, cried out pleadingly, — 


382 


Elsie Returns Home . 


“ ‘ Not yet, oh ! not yet. Let her be, or my heart will 
break.’ 

“ She had the best right to her, so I buried my face in 
Elsie’s mantle, and felt comforted by something she had 
touched. 

Y* “ I tell you, child, no human heart dreams how much it 
can love, till sorrow falls on the object it clings to k] That 
child was sacred to us as an angel then — dearer, a thousand 
times dearer, because they had attempted to crush her with 
disgrace. Her pale cheek, her tremulous lips, all the traces 
of wrong and anguish upon her person, were claims upon 
our tenderness. There was a sort of worship in our grief 
and in our joy. 

“ The fire burned up clear and brightly, but as the chill 
left her poor frame, a sharper consciousness of her position 
seemed ijo stijjg her into restlessness. She clung first to her 
mother, then to me ; twice she bent to kiss me, and then 
drew back with a look of shrinking terror. 

“ ‘ You know, father ; or must I tell you ? ’ she said at 
last. 

“ I tried to smile and make light of the things we had 
heard, by looks rather than speech, and all the time she was 
perusing my soul with her wild eyes. 

‘“You did not believe it,’ she cried, with a hysterical 
laugh, ‘ I knew it — I was sure of it. But, father, mother, 
he has turned me out-of-doors.’ 

“ ‘ My child,’ cried the mother, giving way to tenderness. 

‘ But you are home, you are with us, your own mother, your 
dear old father.’ 

“‘I know,’ said Elsie, ‘I thought of that when they 
turned me out-of-doors. I will return, said I, to my father’s 
house, a prodigal, but without his sin. Father, believe that ; 
you surely believe that, mother.’ 

“ ‘ My child, my own child,’ answered the mother. 

“ ‘I know that you believe me,’ she said, and a faint 
smile stole across her lip. 


Elsie Returns Home. 383 

“ The mother caressed her, smoothing back the black hair 
from her temples, as if she had been a child. 

“ ‘ Tell us, daughter, tell us all/ she whispered, tenderly. 

“ Elsie started up. Fire sparkled through the tears in 
her eyes. But quickly as it had kindled, the angry light 
went out ; and sinking to her mother’s bosom, she answered, 
amid her sobs, — 

“ ‘Mother, they have denounced me, they have covered 
me with scorn.’ 

“ ‘ They — my child ! Of whom are you speaking ? ’ 

“ Of him — my husband — of De Marke and the French 
woman, w T ho has poisoned his heart against me. Oh ! 
.another, if she had never entered this house — if she never 
Had.’ 

‘ ‘But your child, our grandson?’ I inquired, after she 
had grown calmer. 

“ Elsie shook her head wearily. ‘ I asked for him, father. 
I begged on my knees that they would give me my child. 
I prayed, I wept, I went mad before them ; but it was all of 
no use. My boy — my boy ! ’ 

“ She broke off moaning, and began to rock herself to and 
fro, calling out, in tones of piteous tenderness, ‘ My boy — 
my boy ! ’ 

“Thus we got the history of her wrongs, in snatches, 
among tears and tender wailings over the happiness torn 
from her. 

“It was true, De Marke had turned her from his door; 
and the Frenchwoman, her accuser, remained behind. 
When the sunrise sent its gleams of gold aslant the snow- 
drifts around us, we had gathered all the facts that she 
could relate. That French fiend, by cunning and falsehood, 
had separated my daughter from her husband. Elsie had 
come back to us, branded and denounced, but innocent as 
the angels. 

“ I sought De Marke, in order to defend my child ; but 


384 


Elsie Returns Home. 


he would not receive me. I wrote to him, he sent my let- 
ters back unanswered. But Elsie would not believe him in 
earnest. She, poor child, still had her dreams and her de- 
lusions. They were wearing her to a shadow; but she 
could not give them up. 

“‘ The child/ she would plead, ‘surely he will give back 
my child/ 

“ Thus, day after day, she lived and hoped on. 

“ But the end came at last. Be Marke entered proceed- 
ings for a divorce. I employed counsel. I spent half my 
substance in defending the honor of my child. But it was 
all in vain. The divorce was granted, and our daughter 
branded forever — forever separated from her husband and 
child. Now listen. That Frenchwoman was the principal 
witness against Elsie, and in six months De Marke married 
her. It was this news which drove our daughter wholly 
mad.” 

The old man ceased. The perspiration stood in drops on 
his forehead. This renewal of sorrow had exhausted him. 

Catharine looked at him sadly. 

“ Forgive me,” she said. “ I have given you pain. But 
for this knowledge, I too*niust have gone mad ! One word 
more. This Frenchwoman? Have you seen her?” 

“Yes,” answered the old man, “was the woman, you re- 
member her. See how sin levels down the soul. Tell me, 
is not the fate of my child preferable to that?” 

“I know this woman!” said Catharine, gently; “she is 
indeed punished through the degradation of her own nature. 
But the son ? Did Elsie never see her son ? ” 

“Poor Elsie! She would not have known him. For 
many years we were compelled to keep her in the asylum, 
from whence she was removed to the care of Mrs. Barr. I 
believe that De Marke thought her dead, for until the day 
that miserable woman appeared at the library- window, we 
never saw either of them.” 


Elsie Returns Home. 


385 


“ And you have never seen her son ?” 

“ He has never inquired after his mother — nor attempted 
to open any communication with us. He may even be 
dead.” 

“ Is it not possible that he may have been brought up in 
ignorance of these facts ? I almost think so,” said Catha- 
rine. 

“ I do not know — and poor Elsie, what good would it be 
to her ? She has forgotten everything.” 

As he spoke, the old man arose, and walked into an 
inner room, closing the door after him. Catharine looked 
around, and saw that Mrs. Ford had disappeared also; in- 
deed, the dear old lady had stolen away in the early part 
of this conversation, overcome by the mournful reminis- 
cences it brought upon her. 

When she found herself quite alone, Catharine gave way 
to a storm of feeling that shook her to the soul. She 
walked up and down the room, murmuring to herself, link- 
ing and unlinking her fingers, brushing back the hair from 
her hot temples, and tossing her arms upward, as if the 
room were too small for such emotions. She seemed, for 
the time, almost as wild as her charge. While in this state 
of excitement, she saw Elsie moving across the lawn, and 
struck by a sudden glow of affection, ran out to meet her. 

“ Mother! mother, his mother,” she cried, throwing herself 
on Elsie’s bosom. “His mother, his mother, and mine. 
Oh, thank God, thank God, that he sent me here!” 

Elsie looked down upon that glowing face, with a sweet, 
vacant smile, and began to sing a lullaby, such as had 
sent her lost infant to sleep. 

With a heavy sigh, Catharine arose from that uncon- 
scious bosom, and wandered away down to the sea-shore, 
Where she could think and resolve in solitude. 

24 


386 


Announcement of the Wedding . 


CHAPTER LXXIV. 

ANNOUNCEMENT OF THE WEDDING. 

T HE revelations, in the last chapter, were a source of 
new-born peace to Catharine. She felt at home, for the 
first time in her life. A few words had knitted her forever 
to those good old people, who had been so long her friends. 
Grandfather — grandmother — his, and consequently hers. 
She repeated this in the depths of her heart a thousand 
times ; she would sit, for minutes together, regarding them 
■with looks of unutterable tenderness. Her heart would leap 
at the sound of their voices, and when they spoke to her 
more confidingly than heretofore, for in the fulness of their 
confidence this was natural, her eyes would fill with gentle 
thankfulness. 

Still, she told them nothing, but asked for a little time, 
only a little ; and then her heart should be laid open as 
theirs had been. 

And the old people were content. For they saw that the 
revelation they had made opened new springs of affection 
in the young woman’s bosom ; that her former care of Elsie 
became devotion now ; that a new power of love followed 
every look and word, which the poor demented one uttered. 

Still, these pure souls did not entirely read that young 
heart ; they could not hear the words, “ his mother,’’ which 
always trembled, unspoken, on her lips, when she looked at 
Elsie. They could not understand the tender light, that 
forever brooded in her eyes, nor feel the thrill that ran 
through her nerves, at the touch of their caressing hands, 
or the glances of Elsie’s midnight eyes. It was enough for 
her that their blood ran through his veins ; that Elsie, poor 
insane Elsie, was his owp mother, 


Announcement of the Wedding . 387 

These thoughts and feelings were uppermost for some 
days. Catharine would not reflect that the man, whose un- 
known relatives were so dear to her, had abandoned her to 
poverty and death ; that he had never inquired about her 
fate at the hospital, or if so, had avoided seeking her out. 
She would not remember that this man was, even now, about 
to unite himself to another, whom he had vainly loved be- 
fore, taking compassion on her perhaps too evident affec- 
tion. Above all, her pure soul revolted at the thought that 
another of his victims had perished by her own couch of 
pain, and that his child was left to wander alone, into any 
shelter that Providence might provide for the orphan. 

But the heart cannot always silence a clear understand- 
ing. After a time, Catharine began to feel that a poison 
still lay in the cup of peace, so unexpectedly presented to 
her. Again her step grew slow, and her eyes sad. The 
love with which she regarded the household was full of 
yearning pain. She had lost all power to unite her thoughts 
of George De Marke with these good old people. He was 
all a De Marke, the son of that domestic traitor, the evil 
of his nature was an inheritance. That man had nothing 
in common with the Fords ; the blood might be in his veins ; 
but it was poisoned, every drop, by that of the De Markes. 

Catharine rejoiced that Mrs. Oakley had been informed, 
regarding the falsehood of De Marke, without her agency. 
It seemed to her impossible to speak of his faults to any one. 
His treason to herself was so deeply buried in the depths of 
her heart, that it would be death to drag the secret forth, 
even to prevent further wrong. She thanked God again and 
again, that this terrible duty had been spared her. The 
very thoughts of appearing as his accuser, filled her with 
dismay. 

But she avoided Mrs. Oakley. A feeling of vague pain, 
half jealousy, half compassion, kept her away from the cot- 
tage, More than this, she shrunk from looking at the child 


388 Announcement of the Wedding. 

again. His child and not hers. Poor, poor Catharine ! In 
every way how wickedly she had been wronged, how cruelly 
bereaved! No wonder she shrunk from looking on the 
handsome widow, his beloved, and the beautiful boy, his son. 
Her husband, yes ! he was her husband, though she might 
never have the power to prove it. 

Thus Catharine avoided the cottage and the sea-shore, and 
her walks all turned to an opposite direction. She shrunk 
even from looking toward the house. Thus weeks went on, 
and the two families never met. The widow was too happy 
for any thought of her neighbors, and after seeking Catha- 
rine in her usual haunts awhile, always in vain, she went up 
to her mother’s house in town; for her wedding-day had 
been privately fixed, and there were papers to sign and 
bridal garments to order. 

One day, a servant-woman from Mrs. Oakley’s house came 
abruptly up to where Catharine was standing, and told her 
this, in a blunt, rude way, that brought a sudden cry from 
the poor girl, thus taken by surprise. 

The woman looked at her keenly, and a strange smile 
broke over her face, as she heard this cry. “ I thought so,’’ 
she muttered, turning away abruptly, as she had advanced, 
“I knew it, now we’ll see.” 

Catharine followed her. “ When, when does this take 
place ? ” she said, pale and wild, like one who had suddenly 
received sentence of death. 

“ To-night. A crowd of guests came with them in a 
steamer hired expressly for the wedding-party. Mrs. Town- 
send Oakley sent particular word that you were to be invited 
to meet them. Of course you will come ? ” 

Catharine parted her pale lips to speak, but could not 
utter a word. 

“ She wishes you to stand bridesmaid, and Ije at the cot- 
tage when they arrive. As her best friend, she hopes you 
will receive them, and see that the servants make no 
blunders.” 


Announcement of the Wedding. 389 

“ Me, me ! ” burst from Catharine’s lips, in a cry of such 
agony, that the woman stepped back with a startled look, 
which soon passed away, however, and that gleam of singu- 
lar intelligence again resumed its place. “ Me her brides- 
maid!” 

“You will certainly come. The mistress depends upon it,” 
she said, without appearing to heed the cry. 

“ I cannot. Oh, my God ! I cannot do it. This is too 
much — too much I I shall drop dead under torture ! ” 

A look of rude compassion came to the woman’s face. 
She drew close to Catharine, and touched her on the arm. 

“You must be there, or the thing will go on!” 

“ What thing, woman ? ” 

“The marriage of my mistress, Mrs. Townsend Oakley, 
with another woman’s husband — that is the thing ! ” 

Catharine looked at the woman in affright. 

“ What ! what do you know ? ” 

“ I know that much, at any rate.” 

“How — where — when?. In the name of heaven, what 
are you ? ” 

“Mrs. Townsend Oakley’s servant, — nothing else.” 

“ But you said something that seems wild. How do you 
know — ” 

“That Mr. De Marke is a married man — is that what 
you ask?” 

“Yes, that is what I ask!” answered Catharine, in a 
strained, husky voice. 

“ How do you know it ? ” said the woman. 

“ Me — me — how do I know it. God help me — how do 
I know it. I — ” 

“ You see that I do know it, and that I know you, Catha- 
rine Lacy.” 

Catharine staggered back, warding the woman off with 
her hands, as she drew closer to her. 

“ That name, why do you call me by that name? I do 


390 Announcement of the Wedding. 

not bear it. I will not hear it — I tell you, woman, it is 
not my name.” 

“ Eight,” answered the woman, smiling shrewdly, “ it is 
not your name.” 

“Well then, if it is not my name, why torment me with 
it? What does Mrs. Oakley want of me? I am not her 
friend. No one is my friend. I am alone, quite, quite, 
alone ! ” 

“ I am your friend.” 

“ Y ou, and tell me news like this ?” 

“You wish to prevent this wedding.” 

“No, no; I wish nothing, I hope nothing. I have a hard 
duty that will torture me, that is all.” 

“ But you must prevent it.” 

“ I must. Yes, I have known that all along. But how ? 
Great heaven ! direct me how.” 

“ Tell them he has a wife already.” 

“ A wife. What wife ? ” 

“ Catharine Lacy, the name which is not yours.” 

“ What do you say, woman ? How is it you would have 
me act?” 

“ Go down to the cottage, meet them as they desire, and 
when the clergyman calls upon those who know of a just 
cause, or impediment, — I believe that ’s the way it runs, — 
step forward, and stand face to face with Catharine Lacy’s 
husband, and tell him that she lives.” 

Catharine wrung her hands distractedly. “ I cannot, I 
should drop dead at their feet. How can I do this without 
proof?” 

“ Is not your presence proof? ” 

“No! I am changed. Even if they have ever known me, 
I could not prove an identity.” 

“ Still you are his wife.” 

“ I did not say it.” 

“ Besides this — to help them on — they can prove that 


Announcement of the Wedding. 391 

Catharine Lacy is dead by the hospital books. I know that 
well enough, though you may not/’ said the woman, with a 
confidential air ; “ but what then ? ” 

“ It would be sufficient proof against anything I could 
say, if that be true.” 

“ But he would know you. True enough, your hair is a 
shade darker, you look taller and larger, your whole person 
is changed ; but you have the old smile, and the same eyes. 
I knew yo!>, why should not he? ” 

“ Oh, do not ask — he will not wish it.” 

“ And you will see him marry another. This may be re- 
finement, ma’am; but to my thinking, it’s taking part in 
the*wickedness.” 

Catharine shrunk within herself, and her features grew 
pinched with sudden anguish. For a long time she remained 
silent, gazing wildly on the woman. At last her pale lips 
parted. 

“True, true. O my God, my God, guide me — guide 
me ! ” She sunk upon a fragment of rock, as these words 
broke forth, and buried her face in the drapery of her shawl. 

The woman stood over her, and said, “You see it must be 
done.” 

Catharine moaned faintly. 

“ Or a great crime will lie at your door.” 

Again Catharine moaned. 

“ This man deserves it all.” 

A shudder ran through Catharine’s frame ; but she did 
not look up. 

“You will be sure and come,” persisted the woman. 

“Yes,” said Catharine, looking up, “it must be. God 
knows, if it were not to prevent sin, I would never remind 
him of all he wishes to forget. I would live and die alone, 
rather than intrude my wrongs upon his happiness. But he 
leaves me no choice.” 

“You are resolute?” questioned the woman. 


392 Announcement of the Wedding. 

“ Yes ; the thing may kill me, but I will come. Still 1 
warn you, woman, it will be to meet unbelief and disgrace. 
I have no proof to offer, and have outlived my own identity.” 

The woman made an irresolute movement; plunged a 
hand into her pocket, and took it out again empty. Then, 
casting another glance at the trembling creature before her, 
she gave a more deliberate plunge, and drew forth an old 
pocket-book, from which she extracted, first a diamond ear- 
ring, which she clasped in the palm of one hand with two 
fingers, while she searched among some soiled papers with 
the other. At last she drew forth a scrap of paper, which 
she carefully unfolded and read. Catharine watched these 
movements with a look of wistful curiosity. The strange 
woman had won a sort of authority over her, and for the 
time she was almost helpless. 

“You are determined to do the right thing, and put a stop 
to this marriage,” she said, holding the paper irresolutely. 

“ I must,” said Catharine. “ It will ruin me, and ruin 
him ; but that is better than a great sin. They will not 
believe me ; but I will speak.” 

“ They shall believe you ! ” answered the woman per- 
emptorily, “ ask him if he dares dispute that ? ” 

Catharine took the paper, which Jane Kelly held out, and 
glanced at it; but her head grew giddy, and the letters 
floated like traceries of mist before her eyes. She only 
knew that it was a certificate of her own marriage with 
George De Marke. Her hands began to tremble violently : 
she burst into a passion of tears. 

“Your courage will not fail,” said Jane, “I may be sure 
of that.” 

“ My duty cannot fail ; I must do it,” answered Catharine, 
, sadly. 

“ Then I will go home. Remember, they will arrive at 
sunset. After that, you must not count on any time as 
safe.” 


393 


The Interrupted Ceremony. 

“ I know, I know,” murmured Catharine, gazing wistfully 
upon the certificate in her hand, “ there can be no wavering, 
no doubt now : in this paper, God has unfolded my duty.” 

She looked around. The woman had disappeared. Cath- 
arine was alone with her God. 


CHAPTER LXXY. 

THE INTERRUPTED CEREMONY. 

T HAT night, a small steamer put in at a landing, not far 
from Mrs. Oakley’s cottage, and a crowd of cheerful, 
richly dressed persons came, in scattered groups, along the 
shore, chattering, laughing, and making the sweet air joyous 
with merriment. There was one group quieter than the rest, 
and over which a gentle serenity, almost amounting to sad- 
ness, seemed to reign. This was the bridal party. George 
De Marke walked gravely by his brother, leading the adopt- 
ed son by the hand ; and the child now and then brought a 
smile to his lips, by his pretty surprise at the number of 
persons who seemed to be visitors at his home. 

At the right hand of the widow-bride moved the stately 
Mrs. Judson, all smiles and condescension to the man whom, 
a few days before, she was ready to crush into the earth with 
sovereign disdain. Her dress of purple and gold brocade 
swept the grass with its rich folds, and she wore her mantilla 
of old point as a queen displays the ermine of royalty. 

There was no bridesmaid, for Mrs. Oakley, in her heart, 
had resolved that Catharine should occupy that position. 
She hoped to see her in time to enter into all those explana- 
tions which would render the position unexceptionable to her 
friend. 

As they approached the cottage, the bride looked anxiously 


394 


The Interrupted Ceremony . 

forward, expecting to see Catharine coming forth to greet 
her ; in this she was disappointed. 

The visitors, many of them, remained out-of-doors, for 
the evening was delightful, and a pleasant breeze stole up 
from the water. Those who preferred it came in-doors, and 
all around the dwelling, inside and out, groups of happy 
people wandered to and fro, ready at any moment to be sum- 
moned to the marriage ceremony. 

Mrs. Oakley went to her room, a little nervous, and some- 
what anxious about the non-appearance of her intended 
bridesmaid. The chambermaid was very busy, upon her 
knees, unpacking a trunk which contained the bridal para- 
phernalia. There was a half sneer upon her face, as she 
unfolded the snowy robe, and laid out the mist-like veil of 
Brussels’ point, with which the bridal wreath was entwined, 
ready for the fair brow it was to crown. 

“ What is this? two dresses, and white lace trimmings for 
both,” said Jane, gruffly, laying the dresses side by side, 
across the bed. “ According to my judgment, one will be 
too many.” 

Jane muttered the last words in her throat, as she stood 
eying the bridal robes askance. 

“ Yes, yes,” said the bride, hurriedly, “ the dress nearest 
you, wreath and everything, is intended for Miss Barr. Send 
some one to say that we are here, and tell her to lose no time, 
we shall be waiting for her. Of course, you gave my invi- 
tations.” 

The girl answered, that she had delivered both ; and as 
she spoke, the bride saw a smile, creeping, like a viper, 
across her lips. 

“ They will come, of course. Nothing has gone wrong, I 
hope.” 

“ Oh, it is a sure thing, ma’am ; they ’ll come.” 

Mrs. Oakley had no time to regard the manner of this 
reply. She felt a little uneasy at the absence of Catharine, 


The Interrupted Ceremony . 395 

more because it would delay an exculpation of her lover, 
than from any doubt of her willingness to accept the com- 
pliment she had extended in the invitation. 

“ Well, well, it is no matter,” she said, talking pleasantly 
to herself, as Jane disappeared with the garments she had 
been directed to have ready for the bridesmaid. “Of course, 
she will be confident that all is right, or it would not have 
come to this. I wonder what dear, proud mamma will say 
to my choice of a bridesmaid. At any rate, she must admit 
her a lady in everything. Nothing but her refinement and 
gentle goodness have made those old people regard her as 
a daughter of the house. 

As the bride was arranging things thus cheerfully in her 
mind, the lady mother came in, her purple silk rustling as 
she walked, and a cluster of marabout feathers trembling 
like a handful of snowflakes, where it fastened the frost-like 
lace of her elaborate head-dress. 

As Mrs. Judson came into the room, the chambermaid 
stole quietly out, cautiously keeping her back toward that 
lady. 

“ Not ready yet,” cried the stately dame, drawing on her 
own white gloves with deliberate gravity. “ I have brought 
my maid to help you, child. Come, come, begin at once, or 
you will be flushed, the most vulgar thing that can happen 
to a person in your position. Be active,” she continued, 
speaking to a woman who had followed her into the room, 
“ do Mrs. Oakley’s hair at once ; I will stand by and direct 
you.” 

Smiling and blushing a little, the bride placed herself in 
a seat, and taking out her comb, allowed her raven tresses to 
fall in a torrent over her shoulders. The toilet now com- 
menced in earnest. Braid after braid of those glittering 
locks was wreathed around her shapely head, as she sat, with 
a rose-tinted dressing-gown gathered over the snow of her 
bridal garments, while the woman adorned her person ; and 


396 The Interrupted Ceremony . 

Mrs. Judson gave directions, making herself more than usu- 
ally gracious. 

At length the lady’s maid had completed her work. 
Around that coil of raven braids lay a garland of white 
roses, and as the bride stood up, allowing the dressing-gown 
to fall in rosy masses around her feet, a cloud of misty lace, 
touched as it were with traces of early frost, rippled in trans- 
parent waves down the folds of her moire dress, sweeping to 
the snow of her satin slippers. Thus the bride stood, lovely 
as a dream, beneath the proud smile of her mother. 

“ But the bridesmaid ! where is she ? ” questioned the elder 
lady, looking at a clock upon the mantelpiece. “It is 
nearly time.” 

“ She will be here, I dare say,” answered the bride, step- 
ping before the dressing-glass, with a faint blush at her own 
exceeding beauty. “You will like her, I am sure, mamma. 
She is so sweet and lady-like.” 

“ But you have not told me who she is, daughter?” 

“ Oh, she is one of the dearest creatures in the world, a 
sort of protege, or adopted daughter of Mrs. Ford’s, up at 
the old stone house, yonder. Don’t be impatient, she will 
be in time.” 

Mrs. Judson shook her head very pleasantly, for she was 
in high good humor that day. 

“ Ah ! I understand ; some young girl, without advantages, 
that you want to bring out. One of these days you will see 
how foolish such things are.” 

Mrs. Oakley was about to offer some good-natured protest. 
But as she turned to speak, they both heard a slight com- 
motion in the upper hall. 


Righted at Last 


397 


CHAPTER LXXYI. 

RIGHTED AT LAST. 

H ERE she comes ! ” exclaimed the bride, opening the 
door. “ Ah, I was sure of it ! Come in ! come in I 
How late you are ; fortunately your dress is all laid out.” 

Mrs. Oakley held out her hand cordially. Catharine did 
not touch it, but with a gentle inclination of the head, en- 
tered the chamber followed by old Mrs. Ford. 

Mrs. Oakley drew back, surprised and almost offended ; 
for, standing in the hall, directly behind the old lady, she 
saw a white-haired gentleman, leaning upon his cane, as if 
waiting for something. 

“ Of course, I am delighted to see your friends. They 
have given me a pleasant surprise. I scarcely ‘hoped — ” 
Mrs. Oakley stopped suddenly. She had caught a glimpse 
of Catharine’s white face, and drew slowly back, terrified by 
its expression. 

Catharine was clothed in strange beauty that evening. 
A painful wildness glittered in her eyes, her lips were like 
marble, and her cheeks looked cold as snow. She had no 
bonnet on, but a scarlet shawl had been hastily flung over 
her dress of black silk, a costume that contrasted vividly 
with the snow of Mrs. Oakley’s bridal apparel. 

“ What is this ? Why have you come in a black dress, 
and with that mournful face?” she questioned, while Mrs. 
Judson drew proudly up, first in resentful astonishment, 
then with a slow dawning of memory, that left her pale and 
aghast, but still haughtily upright. 

“ I have come,” said Catharine, in a low, pained voice, 
“ I have come, because it must be. Not to share your joy, 
but to quench it. Not to witness your marriage, for the 
man who waits for you — I would soften these words, if I 
knew how, but it must be said — is my own husband.” 


398 


Righted at Last. 


For a moment there was a dead silence in the room. ' 
Every face was white, and every person dumb with amaze- | 
ment. 

“ I wish,” said Catharine, “ this duty had been spared me. j 
I struggled and prayed to cast it off. The wreck of one 
heart was enough. I would not have waited so long, or 
have spoken now, but that silence would become guilt .’ 1 

“ This is not true ! ” exclaimed the bride, pressing a hand 
to her heart, that trembled and throbbed till the cloud of 
lace that fell over it shook with the agony. “ I tell you the 
thing is impossible ! ” 

“ I wish it were. The God of heaven is my judge, that 
I do not wound you, or him, willingly. But it is a^niserable 
duty, which I cannot escape.” 

“ Send for him. Send De Marke hither at once,” almost 
shrieked the bride, as she stood up with an effort at firmness, 
but trembling from head to foot. “ To his face, you must j 
make this charge. Call De Marke, I say ! ” 

The maid went out, leaving the group petrified into silence, 
waiting like so many ghosts. 

They had not long to wait for the bridegroom. He came 
with a light step, in full dress, and with one glove in his 
hand ; a flush of supreme happiness was on his face. He 
could not speak without smiling. 

“ Is it time? ” he said, pausing at the door, in not ungrace- 1 
ful confusion, as he saw that it was a dressing-room to which 
he had been summoned. 

But the silence, and the pale faces turned upon him, drove 
the blush and smile instantly away. He stepped hastily 
forward. “What is this? You are pale, you tremble. 
Great heavens, what has happened ? Is she ill ? ” 

He looked first at Mrs. Oakley, then at her mother, re- 
peating, “ Is she ill — is she ill ? ” 

Mrs. Oakley, without removing the left hand from her heart, 
pointed toward Catharine, who stood, pale and motionless, 
with her eyes fixed on his face. 


399 


Righted at Last 

“ Look on that woman, and say if she is known to you.” 

De Marke turned and looked in Catharine’s face. His 
glance was firm and searching, his countenance agitated, but 
truthful as noonday. “No,” he said, “I haven’t the 
slightest recollection of this lady; yet — yet there is some- 
thing in her face — ” 

“ Then you know her — it is true — mother, mother! ” 

The bride staggered back, clinging to Mrs. Judson, who 
stood in her place, firm and cold as a statue. 

“No, I did not say that — there was something in the 
eyes ; but it is gone — certainly I have never seen this 
lady before ! ’’ 

Catharine uttered a low moan, and moving toward him, 
put the hair back from her temples with both hands, expos- 
ing her beautiful but deathly features to his entire scrutiny. 
He looked at her with a glance as cold as ice ; that look fell 
upon her like a blight ; she reeled, a mist swum before her 
eyes, and she could not discern a feature of the face to which 
her own was so pathetically uplifted. Not a word did those 
white lips utter. She stood before him, mute and trembling, 
till the young man turned away, pained and almost angry. 

Then all the strength left that poor wife, and she fell 
forward upon her knees. 

“Explain this scene, if you can, madam,” said the young 
man, motioning Catharine away with his hand, while he 
turned to Mrs. Judson. 

Before the lady could answer, Catharine held up one hand, 
with a paper quivering like a dead leaf between the fingers. 

“ Look at me! look at me ! I am Catharine. Forgive me. 
They would not let me die — forgive me ; but I am Catha- 
rine Lacy. ” 

De Marke snatched the paper from her hand, read it at 
a glance, and with an exclamation of “ thank God — oh! 
thank God,” uttered as it were in a flood of joy, lifted Cath- 
arine from his feet, and kissed her upon the forehead, Again 
and again. 


400 


Righted at Last . 

The bride uttered a cry, sharp with pain ; De Marke took 
no heed of it, but bent tenderly over Catharine. 

“ And is it indeed true ? Catharine, Catharine Lacy ? 
Oh ! this is joy indeed.” 

“ Mother, mother, take me away ; he wishes to kill me ! ” 
cried the bride, throwing her arms wildly around Mrs. 
Judson. 

De Marke heard her, and looked around. 

“No, beloved, no, — I am only mad with joy. One mo- 
ment, one moment ! ” 

Putting Catharine gently away, he rushed past Mrs. Jud- 
son, pressed the pale hand of her daughter suddenly to his 
lips, and left the room. 

Again all was still. Mrs. Judson whispered soothing words 
to her daughter, and old Mrs. Ford knelt beside Catharine, 
who lay weak and helpless on her bosom. 

De Marke returned, flushed, smiling, but with tears’in his 
eyes. Directly behind him came another person, so like 
himself, that a stranger might have been startled by a re- 
semblance so remarkable. 

“ Bee ! there she is, take care of her yourself, George, while 
I beg pardon of this lady.” 

George De Marke fell upon his knees before the old lady, 
who still held Catharine in her arms. 

“ Give her to me ! Let me look on her face. Catharine, 
Catharine, my wife, my wife ! ” 

Catharine knew the voice. She started up. In an instant 
her face was flooded with tears. The other voice had seemed 
cold and strange — this penetrated her very soul. She 
reached out her arms like a little child a long sweet sigh, 
as he gathered her to his bosom ; and then it seemed as if 
she could never speak again, that trance of happiness was so 
perfect. George De Marke was still upon his knees, holding 
his wife in those strong arms, and thanking God that she 
was his again, when old Mrs. Ford arose and laid her two 


Righted at Last. 


401 


hands upon his head, with the softest and sweetest blessing that 
ever came out of a woman’s heart. 

The young man looked up and met her eyes — those meek, 
brown eyes, so full of pathetic tenderness. Then an old man 
came into the group, and laid his hand, all wrinkled and 
quivering, upon those of the gentle matron. 

“ Son of my child,” he said, “ God’s blessing be with you, 
even as mine is! ” 

A soft and holy amen stole from the lips of that dear old 
lady. Then the venerable couple retreated a little way off, 
leaving the dew of their benediction on the young man’s 
heart, which had risen full and gratefully to the touch of 
those hands. 

“ You have been her friends, I can see that. God bless you 
for it!” 

“Yes,” answered the old woman, gently, “we are her 
friends and your grandparents.” 

“ My grandparents ! I do not know what all this means ; 
but God bless you both for everything you are and have 
done. Catharine shall tell me all about it. I want to hear 
her voice. (J. l/ook up, darling, and tell me if I belong to this 
dear old lady and gentleman.” 

Catharine struggled a little in his arms and lifted her face 
from his bosom ; it had fallen there, pale as a lily, but now 
the flush of summer roses glowed upon it from neck to fore- 
head. Happiness had made her radiant. 

“ Not now,” said the old man ; “ let us take nothing from 
her happiness. To-morrow our grandson will come to us, 
but now he belongs to her.” 

And so the old couple went quietly home together, thank- 
ing God all the way. 

One by one the persons who had witnessed the reunion of 
that husband and wife glided from the room ; and for a few 
precious minutes they were alone together. But scarcely a 
word was said. They looked in each other’s faces, smiling, 
25 


402 


Righted at Last. 


and yet with a shy sort of reserve, wondering at themselves 
that, having so much to say, sweet silence seemed pleasanter 
than words. 

“ Yes, darling, you have changed, but only to become more 
lovely,” he said in answer to the fond question in her eyes. 
“ And I — you would not have known me, I am certain.” 

“ I had but to hear your voice, the tears blinded me so — 
now that I can see you, it is the same face, older, braver.” 

“ But brother Louis is more like what I was. No wonder 
you took him for me.” 

“ But I do wonder my eyes were traitors. How would 
they betray me so ? but I only saw him from a distance, and 
to-night my distress — ” 

Here Mrs. Oakley knocked at the door, interrupting them. 

“ Come,” she said, “the people below are getting impatient. 
I want my bridesmaid. Louis is waiting for you in the 
other room, Mr. He Marke.” 

George He Marke went out, obediently, and then Mrs. 
Judson’s maid commenced a second toilet, to which Catharine 
submitted without protest; she was far too happy for any- 
thing like that. 

The bridal ceremony was delayed a little ; and that was 
all the guests knew of the scene we have just described. 
Half an hour later there came forth from that chamber 
four persons so radiant with happiness, so grandly beautiful, 
that curiosity, if any had existed, was swallowed up in 
admiration. A murrqur of surprise ran from lip to lip, 
for the moonlight beauty of the bride was exquisitely 
contrasted by the radiant loveliness of her bridesmaid, 
who was, it began to be whispered about, already married 
to the elder brother of the bridegroom, excellent matches 
both, for Madame He Marke, the mother, had left an im- 
mense fortune, which would be divided equally between the 
young men. 

The guests also observed that Mrs. Judson ? the stately 


403 


About the Little Boy. 

mother of the bride, lost somewhat of her queenly self-pos- 
session that night. She kept aloof from the wedding-party, 
and seemed shy of addressing the bridesmaid, while giving 
congratulations to her daughter and the newly married 
husband. But these things were only matters of passing 
comment, and no one guessed how deep a current of human 
joy was swelling beneath the commonplaces of this wedding. 


CHAPTER LXXVII. 

ABOUT THE LITTLE BOY 

T HREE weeks after the wedding, George De Marke and 
his wife were established in the home that had been his 
father’s. For the first time in his life, he had learned the 
particulars of a domestic drama, which had cast his infancy 
under the influence of that miserable Frenchwoman, whose 
sins had at last centred into the meanest and most grinding 
of all vices. 

A little week before, this man had deemed himself an 
isolated being, with no one to love or cling to, except the 
brother, whose happiness he had resolved to witness, and 
then become a wanderer again. Now he was at home, 
settled for life under the roof of ancestors whose very ex- 
istence had been unknown to him. His mother, whose in- 
sanity had taken a gentle and more poetic turn since the 
death of her enemy, as if even from the distance she had 
felt the atmosphere of her life relieved of its poison, hovered 
around him caressingly and with pleasant smiles, for she 
fancied the husband of her youth had come back again. 
She no longer shrunk from the picture, which had been re- 
turned to its old place on the wall £but would talk to it for 


404 


About the Little Boy . 


hours, evidently substituting its inanimate features for those 
of her son when he was away. 

But there was still a shadow upon the life of that young 
couple : the memory of a child, that had perished, and for 
which there was forever an unsilcnced yearning in the 
mother’s heart. The proof of its death was so vague, that 
sometimes wild dreams of its existence forced themselves upon 
her; and these feelings she had imparted to her husband. 

One day De Marke had just left Catharine alone in the 
library, with the sashes of the great bay-window open, when 
two women came by on their way to the front of the house. 
One was Mrs. Louis De Marke’s servant, who had disap- 
peared the night after the wedding, and the other a comely 
little Irish woman, whose face Catharine instantly recognized. 
She sprang up with an exclamation of pleasant surprise and 
ran to the window. 

“Mary Margaret — Mrs. Dillon!” 

Mary Margaret and her companion turned, and came 
tow r ard the window. 

“Oh! is it there ye are, me darlint?” said the good- 
hearted woman, “with yer husband to the fore, and no 
thanks to anybody. Faix ! but I ’m glad to get a sight of 
yer beautiful countenance agin, and I’ve com’ all the way 
down here to give ye a taste of happiness that ye haven’t 
dreamed of. What do you say, darlint, to a child of yer 
own, just the beautifullest crathur ? ” 

“ Hush,” said Catharine, bending from the open casement, 
and reaching out her hand to Mary Margaret. “ This is a 
cruel subject to jest on ! ” 

“She isn’t joking, not she,” said Jane Kelly; “I’ve 
brought her down here, just to strengthen what I have to 
say, and what I never would have said on earth, if he there 
had n’t proved to be another woman’s son. If that old 
Frenchwoman had been his mother, he might have searched 
till doomsday, and never found the little fellow after all. 


405 


About the Little Boy. 

“Catharine Lacy, I was your nurse at the hospital; I took 
the living child from your bosom, and placed the dead baby 
of Louisa Oakley in its place. You were raving, and did 
not know it. Don’t look so white and so frightened. I had 
an object. The old French fiend paid me for putting your 
child out of the way. I did not murder for her money ; but 
I changed the infants, and reported yours dead. Mere than 
this, I changed the numbers and names over your cots, and 
that is why you are registered as dead, and buried, instead 
of the other.” 

“ But the child, my child ! ” cried Catharine. 

“ Mary Margaret took it to nurse.” 

“ Mary Margaret ! ” 

“ Yes, yer ladyship,” said Mrs. Dillon, “ I mothered the 
little crathur, all unbeknowst that it was your baby as I 
wsas doing for. Ye had the darlint in yer own blessed arms, 
more ’an onest, and the most beautifullest sight it was to 
see yez together, like the blessed mother of Christ pic- 
tured out over the holy altar, with the hivenly baby in her 
two arms — amin ! ” 

“ But the child, my child ! Where is it ? who has got it 
now ? My own, own child.” 

“It’s a’most forenant ye, this blessed minit, yer ladyship. 
Down in the purty house, behint them trees, a-playin’ in the } - 
garden, as innercent as a young rabbit. Did n’t I just se3 v 
the mark of the holy cross, as red as a ruby, which the angels 
left on his temple — ” 

Mary Margaret broke off suddenly, for Catharine had 
left the window. In another moment they saw her flitting 
across the lawn, and under the elms. She was out of sight 
long before the last sentence was finished. 

“Let’s go after her,” said Jane Kelly. “I want to. see 
their hearts torn in giving him up.” 

But they had hardly crossed the lawn, when Catharine 
came back, walking rapidly, with little Edward in her arms. 


406 


About the Little Boy. 

She rushed by them, raining kisses on the child, and hurry- 
ing on, went panting and breathless into the presence of her 
husband, his grandparents, and Elsie. 

“ George, George, take him — take him, he is our child, 
yours and mine — our own, own child. Grandfather, grand- 
mother, mother, thank God ! thank God ! for it is our son, 
that was lost and is found.” 

There was some reluctance on the part of Mrs. Louis De 
Marke to give up all claim on the child she had loved as 
her own. But all this was compromised in the end by little 
Edward himself, who divided all the hours of his bright life 
pretty equally between the old mansion and the Italian cot- 
tage during the first year. After that he proclaimed a 
determination to give up the cottage altogether, for his 
other mamma had just taken in a mite of a girl-baby that 
was always crying, and had n’t sense enough to walk alone ; 
if she was going to keep that little thing, he meant to live 
at grandfather’s and nowhere else. 


THE END. 


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Political Lyrics. New Hampshire and Nebraska. Illustrated 12 

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Secession, Coercion, and Civil 

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French Policeman, 1 50 

50 


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1 00 
] 00 
1 00 
1 00 
1 00 
1 00 
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75 

75 

75 

75 

75 

75 

75 

50 

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50 

50 

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of Montrose, 50 

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also published of the above, complete 
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Scott’s Poetical Works, 5 00 

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“ NEW NATIONAL EDITION” OF “WAVERLEY NOVELS.” 

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Life of Henry Thomas, 2 > 

G. P. B. JAMES 

Lord Montague’s Page, 1 50 

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75 

50 

. 50 
75 
75 
75 
75 
75 
75 
50 
50 
50 
50 
50 
50 
50 
50 

1 00 

1 00 
50 

1 00 
50 

75 

1 50 
75 
75 

1 50 
50 


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Following the Drum, 


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75 

75 

75 

75 

75 

75 

75 

75 

75 

75 

75 

75 

75 

75 

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50 


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... 75 

1 Grace Dudley ; or, Arnold at 



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t 

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« 


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... 1 50 

Sartaroe, 

1 

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The Wanderer, 

... 1 50 

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1 

50 

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75 

75 


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75 

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50 

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Ellen Wareham, 

Nan Darrel, 


?8 

38 

:;s 

38 


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By Robert Folkstone Williams. 

The Secret Passion, 1 00 I Shokspeare and his Friends,... 1 00 

The Youth of Shakspeare, 1 00 I 


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